


they new yorked new york

by captainfile



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Loki Wins, Battle of New York (Marvel), Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Infinity Gems, Inhumans (Marvel), Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Kree (Marvel), Multiverse, Odin (Marvel)'s A+ Parenting, Post-Battle of New York (Marvel), REALLY slow, Slow Burn, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-03
Updated: 2020-02-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:08:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 30,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22549825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainfile/pseuds/captainfile
Summary: may 4, 2012.to thor and captain america, it seemed a reasonable consequence.to shield, it was bound to happen someday.but to the rest of the world, aliens in the sky were completely unbelievable. superheroes in new york? give me a break. to the rest of the world, the last thing anyone expected was for a crater to replace manhattan and for gruesome, smelly, drooling creatures to remove them from their homes.
Relationships: Loki (Marvel)/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 1





	they new yorked new york

“can someone get the phone?” 

the ringing stops. a few moments pass. 

“who is it?” mom asks, her voice quieter. dad doesn’t say anything back. “well?” she tries again, and then, “what’s wrong?” 

“you know we have room,” he finally mutters, then tells mom, “there’s been an attack, in new york city; the petersons are coming over.” they’re speaking quietly, but sound travels around the house easily, and i’m never nosier than when i’m supposed to be writing a paper. when mom steps into view at the other end of the living room, i frown and close my laptop. she looks shaken. really shaken. i don’t really remember the world trade center attacks, let alone her reaction, but i can suppose it was similar to the ghostly shade she’s taken on now. 

“get your brothers and take your things down to the shelter,” she tells me, voice tight. i just nod, and stare at her for a moment. the thought strikes me- why do we have to hide, if the attack is seven states away? still, her instruction is as good a reason as any to comply. her house, her rules, and all. so i pack everything into my backpack and knock on two doors as i walk down the hallway to my old bedroom. 

“mom says go down to the shelter,” i tell my family, as they poke their heads out. there’s four of us in all; my older brother ethan, then me, then the twins, nathan and ben. ethan never left, but nathan was gracious enough to let me stay in the room he’s been claiming as his own since i left. if this were a tornado, i’d be complaining that i was supposed to come home early, finish my paper, and enjoy my summer break, but no. terrorism. i don’t know what the hell i’m doing. to play it safe, i carry my suitcase and backpack- all i brought from my apartment at school, since i’ll be going back there soon enough- to the garage and into the shelter. dad never parks his car in there during tornado season. since i’m the first one in, i turn on the lights and television, set to the national weather service. 

“- and residents in the following states must evacuate immediately; new york, rhode island, connecticut, massachusetts, vermont, new hampshire, pennsylvania, maryland, delaware, and virginia. residents in the following counties in maine must evacuate immediately-“ 

there’s a huge circle centered around new york city on the screen. it looks like the diagrams used for the effects of earthquakes. 4.4 goes this far, 4.7 this far. we aren’t in the circle, but it sure is cause for concern if ten states are evacuating. a bar of text running across the top of the map tells me a national state of emergency has been declared. ethan steps down into the shelter and catches sight of the television with a frown, mirroring me. 

“-all residents not in the evacuation states are advised to take shelter immediately, in all american states and territories; alabama, alaska, arizona-“ 

“what’s going on?” ethan asks, settling on the floor. i tell him what dad said, and he gathers his things up again to put them more away. the shelter is huge, no doubt, but things get cramped when there’s two families inside. “what kind of attack warrants this much caution?” he wonders aloud, gesturing to the screen. “i mean, it’s like, if nine-eleven happened today, exactly as it did, there’s no way we’d react like this; this is like, there’s a nuke involved.” 

my stomach drops at that, even though he’s just theorizing. 

dad comes down and tells me to turn the sound off and find some nice music. the petersons have an elementary age daughter, if i remember right. “guys, before the pattersons arrive, i just want to fill you in on what’s going on,” he continues once we’ve all settled in. normally she runs around like a chicken with her head cut off when we have to come down here, but today, it seems she isn’t worried about her favorite shirt being blown away. “all the news i could find indicates that aliens have invaded the planet through a portal over new york city.” we’re silenced by shock- it must be a prank, it certainly sounds like a lie, but dad isn’t really the type. his humor is normally limited to puns and mixed-up pop culture references, usually to get us groaning. “they have technology way ahead of ours, and they are not friendly.” that much is clear. “if they succeed in new york city, there’s no doubt they’ll continue, so we need to be prepared to wait this out for longer than usual.” 

“what good would that do?” nathan asks, breathing quickly. “if- if aliens take over, that’s it, right?” mom and dad open their mouths to stop him. “a week extra isn’t going to change things.” 

“this thing is outfitted for a month,” mom finally interrupts him, but it doesn’t really argue against his point. she winces and then sighs. “we’re just going to pray.” we all know better than to argue that, at least. i finish my paper and turn it in before mom and dad turn off the rest of the house. no use keeping the wifi on and the fridge running while we hide out. 

the petersons step in and we seal the door. from there, it’s a waiting game. an hour ago, i was worried about my paper. now, i’m worried about getting blown up or enslaved. why aliens? 

“so vanessa, you’re studying for your phd?” 

“oh,” mrs. peterson surprises me. she must have googled me or something, because my parents rarely refer to me by my full name. “um, yeah, i should be finishing up around the end of this year.” 

“oh, you’re on the home stretch?” 

“yeah,” i nod, trying to ignore that this could all be wrong and i’m actually going to die before december. “i have research lined up in boston, too, which is nice.” everyone has their own little conversations going on, a low hum of nervousness before we settle in for the long haul. the longest i’ve spent in the shelter is twelve hours, but that was because we all fell asleep part of the way through the storm and woke up to sore necks and the house still intact. 

“what will you be researching?” 

thinking about it eases my worries a little bit, just by distracting me. “it’s a combination of biomedical engineering and nanomolecular biology,” i start, but then stop suddenly at mrs. peterson’s alarmed expression. “um.” 

“sounds interesting,” she decides, and turns to her daughter. i try not to sulk, but just end up looking back at the television screen. dad turned on the subtitles. 

“a nuclear weapon has been detonated over new york city. take shelter immediately. this is not a drill,” it reads. my stomach drops. “stay in any secure location available until further instruction is provided, and do not interact with the open air or any rain if the opportunity arises.” the message repeats. i look over at ethan, who looks back at me with wide eyes and thin lips. aliens, and a nuclear bomb. no one mentions it. we play scrabble until dinner, and then sit quietly until we all eventually fall asleep. 

when i wake up, everything is dark and quiet. everyone’s asleep, and the television is off. i slip out of my sleeping bag and step over my neighbors to get to a radio, which i turn on slowly and press against my ear. 

“we’ve been covering this all night, but for those just tuning in,” seems i caught the perfect moment. “an alien army invaded earth beginning yesterday morning in new york city, and according to some major news outlets, an american team of- well, basically iron man and the hulk, some big hitters, were put to the task of defending us from a giant portal. at some point, something called an antimatter catalyzed nuclear pulse propulsion was set on the city, and it was flattened. the aliens continued, as far as we can tell, to come through the portal, and the united nations is scrambling to work out what they want and how to defeat them.” 

my heart is in my throat as i sit next to canned vegetables and hear my younger brothers snore. another voice cuts in. “we’re coming to you live from a military grade bunker, so as long as you don’t lose your radio, you don’t lose us.” 

“that’s right. so, the wind currents?” 

“yes, everyone in this hemisphere should be taking cover. the united states has declared a state of emergency, canada has declared a state of emergency, a few others have, and the united nations are reportedly drafting a global crisis document. the wind will carry the radiation to you, so don’t even think about going out to check on things.” 

“it’s not visible, so you won’t know until the proper authorities with geiger counters say it’s safe. repeat, do not go outside.” 

my eyes well up with tears as the hosts continue to speak. “and we don’t know who sent the missile just yet, so it could have been anyone. i can’t imagine it was a friendly, though, as there were still an estimated seven and a half million people in new york city when it went off.” 

“that’s an estimation based on legal new york residents, not even counting those in surrounding areas, visitors and tourists, those on the road, and the national guard.” i turn the radio off and sit in the quiet for a moment. then i go wake up my dad and cry in his arms because what the hell? yes, i’m twenty five, but no, i’m not prepared for aliens and an atomic bomb! it was easy to ignore when i had to put a brave face on all day for the little kid in the room. now it’s just me and the data at five in the morning. 

two days pass in the shelter without an all-clear. then, in the middle of dinner, the television switches from the weather radar. dad is alarmed, and jumps, but keeps the volume off for the kid’s sake. we all look up, though, and read the subtitles. an imposing image has taken over the screen. a pale man, dressed in green with dark hair framing his face, thin lips turned down. when he speaks, the television slowly transposes his words. 

“humans of mitt guard, known also as earth, allow me to introduce myself,” it reads. “i am low key, of ash guard, and i have come to free your realm of disrepair. by nature, you crave submission, and i will allow it; from this point on, i am what you might refer to as your governor, or the barrier between your planet and your true ruler. don’t worry about rebelling, as any attempts will be crushed like an ant beneath a boot.” he says more, but i squeeze my eyes shut to stop the flow of tears and go back to my dinner. 

we manage a week and a half. i don’t know how long we could have gone, and i don’t get to. i sit with the radio tucked against my ear while everyone lounges and plays a game of cards. 

“this bunker will only hold for so long, folks,” i hear. the hosts sound tired. they manage to get a few words in between loki’s message flying through the airways, but only every few minutes. “we’ve been targeted because of the signal we send out. for us, this might be the end of the road; still, we’re here for all of you. stay sheltered. because of the destruction of earth’s governments, you need to use your own geiger counter to find out if your area is safe; we have little to no confirmation on the spread of the radiation. stay down for as long as you can.”

“i’ve just heard raids beginning on undestroyed homes in pennsylvania. use any and all weaponry you have against the creatures, but do not reveal yourself until they find you. footage from the original battle shows that using their own weapons against them can work, so if you manage to take any of these things out, take their belongings. it’s true, folks, that there is little hope. but do not go down without a fight.” i ran out of tears a while ago, so i just listen to loki and then the two men until it’s time for bed. 

dad wakes me in the middle of the night. my brothers are all already awake and crouched, armed. i wake up mom and the neighbors, and we hide in the bathroom. the little girl cries, but her mother tucks a hand over her mouth to stop her from whimpering. my own mom crushes my hand in her own and bows her head in prayer. 

the shelter door is hit. and then hit again. and then, an explosion. a shriek. the bathroom shakes, and the girl screams, but for the hand stopping her. a few gunshots, and then a scream from one of my family members outside. or maybe my neighbor. a few beats pass, and a few thumps sound, and then the bathroom door is removed. not opened, removed. i’m closest to it, and pulled out by the shoulder. the smell hits me suddenly. 

pus, and mold. the creatures look like the rotten remains of men, reinforced with armor. their mouths click, though, without words or tongues. they have no cheeks to keep drool in, so it drips onto my shoulder. i would say i’m tall- at least compared to my brothers- but the creatures have three feet on me. they duck to fit in the tornado shelter, and walk unevenly, poking me in the back with something sharp to march me past the one body left in the main room. he doesn’t have a head, but i recognize him just fine. so does his daughter, instantly falling into hysterics without her mom to silence her by force. one of the creatures places a helmet on her that keeps the sound in and prevents her from seeing, as far as i can tell when i look back. i try to ignore the smell of burning flesh and blood. try to focus on the fact that my family isn’t headless. or probably isn’t headless. mr. peterson didn’t deserve to die, but no one does. i’d rather it be him than someone i love. 

we’re put onto some sort of hovering boat made of metal with a number of other neighbors. i barely know any of them- i moved out years ago- but my chest is tight still when i take more of each face i see. the creatures handcuff us, but don’t secure us to the vehicle, so we all lurch when it begins to move. begins to fly. actually fly, with only a soft electric hum but no windshield. mom, next to me, leans her head on my shoulder and then suddenly jerks up. she doesn’t dare speak, but i follow her line of sight and finally relax. 

dad and the boys. safe. my brothers are already asleep, and dad seems as relieved as i am. i lean against mom and drift off. 

when i wake up again, there’s nothing. growing up in the midwest, it’s to be expected, but this. this is nothing. my eyes can barely make out the shape of the vehicle, of the other people in it; i hear a loud crashing, like buildings cracking and falling, like thunder, but there’s no visual to provide any sense. it seems the moon is new, or hidden by clouds. mom is asleep against my shoulder, but an older man across from me hisses that we’re flying over the pacific ocean. my view of the world is so different from two weeks ago. i go back to sleep. 

finally, the vehicle stops. i can’t guess where we are, as i haven’t seen much of the world, but i tell my mom about the ocean. she just nods slightly. we’re ushered out with weapons trained on our heads, and an odd looking man stands on the ground waiting for us. his eyes are large and red as blood, red as the blood he draws with a knife. the two people in front of me, he slices open their right hands, and doesn’t care to clean the blade between. for me, he holds up a hand. the creature pushing me pauses. 

“stand here,” he tells me, pointing to the ground beside him. i do. mom steps up, and he grabs her hand, and then slices it open. to some people, he cuts their arm, or to others their face, but i don’t know what we’re being judged on. my dad’s hand is cut, but then the mysterious man tells ethan to stand beside me. and then ben. and then nathan. i press my shoulder against ethan’s. 

this is it. we’ve been conquered by aliens and now separated from our parents. 

when the vehicle is empty, my brothers and i are ushered onto a different one that’s already half full of a mixture of people. it fills up over the next few hours, as vehicles fly in and out of the area. at the very least, i have my brothers. my parents have each other. i fall asleep again after we begin to fly. 

when i wake up, it’s still night; it feels like it’s been night for nearly a week. i miss the sun, dearly, but there finally is a light to see easier by. the creatures usher us off and into a tall building in the middle of some sort of forest. it’s bright, with a million windows, and resembles a palace the longer i stare at it. a creature shoves me and i stumble forward through the doorway. we’re led through another set of doors to what i can only rationalize as a church. flying buttresses, i remember they’re called, high ceilings, glittering jewels everywhere. but there are no seats. three figures stand where the altar would be. one is large and blue skinned, with billowing black hair. another is much smaller, seemingly human. a slave? a traitor? the third figure is loki. 

“kneel,” he says, and we do. a tear has escaped nathan beside me, but he can’t swipe at it without calling attention to himself, so i watch it fall out of the corner of my eye. “i do so love to see this,” loki continues, stepping towards the group. “so willing, so vibrant.” 

“please, just-“ someone yelps, and he ducks down to grab their head in his hands. 

“don’t be afraid,” he soothes them, voice silken, eyes wide. “you’ve been chosen to follow in your ancestors’ footsteps.” slowly, he lets go and stands tall again. “you all met a man who can see your origins, can see what you’re capable of; he is like all of you, special.” the word holds no significance, but i’m not sure i want to be a kree. i’d rather be with my parents. “many years ago, the kree placed themselves among you, and now, they’re here to collect their work; you have the distinct privilege of power, of flying among the stars, of serving your ruler, and me, directly.” 

none of this sounds like a good idea. not that it could; this is loki, the guy from the television, the radio. he’s the alien overlord. the murderer. he steps away, and lifts his hands while a few of the creatures step between the crowd and throw what seem like smoke bombs to the ground. a fog overtakes me, overtakes all of us, and then- 

and then i can’t move. fuck shit fuck i can’t move i can’t see fuck i can’t- i can’t breathe! 

something… falls away. it’s like pulling together a conclusion that feels like bullshit, but that moment when i realize how true it is. when learning becomes understanding, becomes knowledge. 

i can move again, but with a ringing in my ears, with cries of horror all around me, a foul stench, a cold wind, pressure. i blink my eyes open and search for my brothers quickly. nathan is collapsed on the floor, with charred and blistered palms when i look closer. ben continues to kneel, like me. he seems fine. ethan… ethan isn’t there. a cat, brown and shaggy, sits where he was, with a flickering tail and panicked eyes, jaw open in a hiss. i didn’t think the alien invasion could get weirder. i look around at the other people from the vehicle, and see even stranger things. 

an elderly woman with six heads, a middle aged man who seems to be melting, a young child screaming at the top of their lungs, blood, tentacles, rock. loki laughs. over all of it, he laughs. slowly, the panic quiets. 

“you’ve been unlocked,” says the blue figure, in a low toned voice. “but some of you cannot remain, cannot survive like this; you’re mistakes.” the elderly woman suddenly disappears, along with a few others. and the cat. and fuck- and nathan. i try to breathe quietly, but my heart is in my throat as i make eye contact with ben. the child begins to scream again, but is somehow silenced. “the rest of you need to learn control.” the creatures step forward amongst the crowd again and i’m shoved harshly to the ground, drooled on, handcuffed. “you’ll learn control here in loki’s palace.” 

we’re kept in a large room. the effects of the fog seem dimmed, as does everyone’s panic, as the food served isn’t fought over much. i share a loaf of bread with ben and someone nearby, another guy who seems around nathan and ben’s age. ben and i sleep against the wall and each other. he cries, increasing my panic, but i’m long since out of tears. every time i think it can’t get worse. we’re kept for what feels like weeks, given bread and water and sometimes a slab of meat that looks hilariously undercooked but disappears before i can try to get any. i have to teach ben ethan’s breathing exercises because with too much crying comes dehydration, and that’ll only mess us up even more. the room begins to smell worse and worse with waste and vomit and something else spread out everywhere. 

the creatures wade into the room after what feels like months to grab a few people and leave. every few hours, sometimes longer, people are taken. i hold onto ben until we’re of the final few in the room. the creatures come back and pick me up, then him, then finally empty the room, and the door closes behind us with an air of finality. good riddance. maybe loki will keep it like that, hold human waste as a trophy. 

finally, ben and i are tossed to the ground in front of loki in the same room we saw him in before. my handcuffs fall off, and instinctively i rub at my sore wrists. 

“it is your turn to show your ruler what it is you can do.” i recognize the figure from before; they appeared human. a closer look says this isn’t so accurate. with what i’ve seen now i can’t be so sure, but they have snakelike eyes and their hair moves without wind. “you inherited a power.” 

it doesn’t feel like i did. loki motions to the person on the other side of ben and they stand, then breathe fire at him. he watches, unaffected, as the flames part under an invisible wall. the next person reaches back and grabs a creature, but it wilts in their grip, decays within moments. the next person begins to float like the vehicles. ben stands, and i watch him swipe at his face and breathe deep. loki cocks a brow in my periphery, but i focus on my brother. he turns to the creatures. 

“hit me,” he says, and they do. they leap on him, snarling and snapping, and i choke out a sob, seeing him beneath the pile of drool and armor. was that his plan? he’d rather die than be sold? suddenly the creatures fly off of him, and i’m left staring at an entirely undamaged ben. he pants, but slowly sits up, and turns to loki with pure light in his upturned hand. “energy,” he breathes, and it dissipates. loki nods. i swallow nervously. as ben returns to kneels beside me, i’m motioned to stand. but i don’t know what it is i can do. what if i didn’t inherit a power? would i be erased like my other brothers? ben lost his fucking twin. 

“i don’t know,” i whisper, and await judgement. maybe i should have asked the creatures to shoot me. 

“you will,” loki replies easily, with a tight smile. i kneel again. “very well, send the last one for further testing.” the cuffs go back on, and i’m separated from my last family member. it’s hard not to vomit when i walk away from ben, but the creatures shove us, and i find tears welling in my eyes for the first time in weeks. i’m alone. 

i’m placed in what looks like a hotel room; it has a dresser, a restroom that i run to cherish, a spacious bed, a desk, a living chair. a mirror. i gulp down precious water and clean myself best i can, then take a long look at my appearance. i think i look the same, but so did ben. there’s nothing else to be found in the room, so i lie in the bed and sleep. 

there are no windows, but i haven’t had a clock in what feels like months. i just know that i’ve slept when i open my eyes and see loki standing in the corner of the room. i jump slightly, and back up against the headboard, but he holds up a hand. his eyes are dim, not as wide or as crazed as i’ve seen before. 

“what?” i gasp, frozen. 

“tell me your name,” he says, without any explanation. 

“vana.” 

he nods like he already knew. “in a few hours, you’ll be asked to fight a chitauri soldier to reveal your powers, but i need you to lie.” i narrow my eyes in confusion, but he doesn’t seem to care. he just continues, “you must act like you are completely invulnerable.” 

“what is-“ 

“it doesn’t matter what you can do for now, as you’ll find out later; just break all the- the small specks of matter, the really small pieces, when they touch you.” 

“atoms?” 

“i’m not a scientist,” loki huffs, “and i was told all of this in a vision two years ago, so forgive me for not remembering every word i’m supposed to say.” i wonder, as he speaks, if he wanted to be in charge of the alien invasion. in the dark room, his shoulders are lower and his hair looser. he looks comfortable. he’s loki, he owns the earth now, he separated me from my family and killed two of my brothers, and he looks comfortable. i swallow bile and nod. “only as they touch you, it’s how they can be convinced that your power is invulnerability, and i’ll be able to place you at my side.” he pauses for a breath. the blood drains from my face and i clap a hand over my mouth to hold back to bile again- “what is it?” 

i gulp and gasp, shaking my head, but he asks again. “i lost my family,” i whisper; saying it too loudly will make it too real. he tilts his head a bit. 

“in the explosion?” i tell him i don’t know where my parents are and he killed- i stop. “i haven’t killed anyone since the battle in new york, vana.” i ask him where my brothers are, tell him they came with me to his palace. “the inhumans, they’re safe.” he balks at my glare. “i swear to you, they are safe.” i don’t believe him, but i want to, so i nod. he nods in response. “just remember to break the pieces-“ 

“i know,” i interrupt him, before he has to suffer through speaking my language for any longer. he nods again and disappears into thin air. the radio hosts called him the god of lies and mischief; maybe this is a trick? i’ll do it, i don’t want to know what’ll happen if i don’t. he seemed confident that i can break down atoms, but i’m not sure it’s a good idea. it’s kind of a manhattan project idea. regardless, when i’m escorted to a hall like the one they kept all of us in for so long and faced with one of the creatures, i follow loki’s instruction. he watches from behind some sort of glass wall with the two figures next to him again. it’s almost like an imposter came to visit me, though; his hair is plastered to his skull again, eyes wide, lips chapped, hands twitching. 

“do you think you know what it is you can do yet?” the humanoid asks. the creature snarls and clicks. loki, with all the attention away from him, ducks his head and bites his lip. he doesn’t look away. 

“i think,” i answer, and try not to stare at loki as intently as he stares back. “um, attack me,” i tell the creature, and as it approaches eagerly i try to remember how it felt after. like i knew something. but i’ve already studied physics, extensively; i know all the rules. 

the creature swings with a metal weapon. something in me says, “the rules don’t apply to me.” 

i see, suddenly, in my mind as i look at the metal and it appears the same as always. i see what it’s made of and the rules it’s following. loki said to break it, so i do; as each layer of molecules brushes my skin, down to the particles floating between, i dismantle the weapon. the creature swings again and again, and each time i shake the bonds holding its weapon together. normally there’s a price to do this, but instead it only takes my intent, no heat or force. my heart races by the time loki waves to stop the proceedings. 

“amazing,” the humanoid gasps, as everyone stands silent but for the creature and its frustrated clicking. “the inhuman is entirely invulnerable, and will have to undergo testing to find the extent.” 

“assuming there’s no limit,” loki states, “i want her at my side.” 

“what about-“ 

“he has his own bodyguards, i think i deserve one as well, yes?” loki asks. they must be talking about whatever true ruler is supposedly above him. “she may be human, or rather inhuman, but i’m sure she’ll prove useful.” his smile is slow and wicked and i’m disgusted. why can’t i stand up for myself? snarking at the alien overlord hardly counts for anything in the dark. the creature puts my handcuffs back on and escorts- read, shoves- me to a laboratory. it clicks for a few minutes at the blue man, who nods every few minutes, and finally tells me to lie down on a table. 

“my name is brilzal,” he finally introduces himself, which only loki has done so far. “this chitauri tells me its weapon disintegrated whenever it hit you, can you tell me how you felt when this happened?” 

“um, scared?” i answer, twitching slightly as my handcuffs are removed. “i’ve been scared for months, though, so.” 

“you underwent terrigenesis and inherited a power, evidently invulnerability; can you tell me about when you woke up from the mist?” brilzal is polite. i’m confused, but take the opportunity where i can get it to be treated as normal. well, as anyone would be at a doctor’s office. i open my mouth to speak when loki appears in the middle of the room, out of thin air. he looks around for a second before his eyes land on me. 

“they can’t see or hear me,” he says, and i take in his loose shoulders again. am i hallucinating? how do i know this is the real loki? “tell him you don’t really know how to describe it if you need help lying; i’m a bit practiced in that area.” 

maybe he’ll leave if i don’t need his help lying to the one nice alien in the entire universe. “it felt like when i’m in the middle of writing and realize how much i understand about the subject; i’m a scientist, or i was,” i tell brilzal. loki nods and disappears, and i let out a relieved sigh. “but i didn’t know what was different until they took off my handcuffs today.” 

“you could feel it?” 

“it’s like my skin doesn’t want any intruders,” i lie, then, “it acts on its own.” 

“they may shave your head if that’s the case,” brilzal tells me. i pale. “terrans do have an attachment to their hair,” he muses, “i’ll put in a recommendation that you’ll be more willing and effective the more you blend in with other terrans.” i assume he means humans, or earthlings, or whatever. another relieved sigh. finally he pulls over a cart of various materials and tries to hurt me, which isn’t great. i don’t recognize a lot of them, but i recognize the rules, so i can break them. it feels like hours only because he tries one at a time. 

“is that all?” i ask, when he wheels the cart away. he nods, but then pulls out a needle. 

“i need your bloodwork, and clearly you have some sort of control over your power, as you’re still wearing clothes, and you don’t dissolve your handcuffs.” oh. that makes some sense. i was too busy destroying everything he poked me with to realize he tested cotton. “try to tell your skin that this is friendly, welcome.” 

the needle gets closer and loki appears again. “don’t let them draw blood,” he says, and then is gone. so i destroy the needle, too. and the next one until brilzal gives up. 

“sorry,” i say anyways. he just nods and puts my handcuffs back on. the creature- chitauri, i suppose- clicks and shoves me back out into the halls of the palace, eventually leading me back to the same room. i gulp more water and pass out again. 

“i know i didn’t explain much, but the gist is that you’re the one who’s going to kill thanos.” i’m only half awake as i process the words, blink against the darkness, and find loki in the same spot as before. “if you come with me, and i make an audience with him, you can kill him.” 

“who?” i ask. “and why?” 

“i-“ he closes his mouth again. “you probably think me a cruel alien king, but the truth is i’m as much a prisoner as you.” i rub at my eyes and frown in confusion, completely not believing any of loki’s words while i follow his every direction. “i fell from my- from my home world, and he caught me and forced me into his servitude.” he blinks a few times and then ducks his head. “i can talk myself out of a lot of things, so i led his conquest of earth, where a weapon he covets was located.” 

“the nuclear bomb?” i guess. “in new york?” but he shakes his head. 

“the tesseract, and inside it, the space stone, an artifact of near unlimited power,” he explains. “thanos wields it now, but he is powerless against you, as you wield all of the universe’s laws in your mind.” i can hardly say that. even if i had an idea of what i can really do now, the handcuffs seem to dampen my ability. i hold them up. “i have magic, vana, i can trick your mind into forgetting how to use your power.” 

“can thanos?” loki shakes his head again. “what’ll happen after?” 

“after you kill him, i’ll have to figure out how to restore earth to its former order.” my lip curls back in disbelief, but once again, it’s only on the surface. he seems to know everything he needs. “you’ll get your family back, but not until then, i’m afraid.” 

“what if something goes wrong?” he doesn’t answer, but his eyes do, shadowed as they are. we would both die. i nod and he vanishes. “fuck,” i hiss, only to myself, because every time i think it can’t get worse. 

i’m delivered food, but otherwise left alone for a few days, maybe up to a few weeks. but eventually i’m brought back to the first room in the palace, and the humanoid man takes off my handcuffs. 

“i’ll be teaching you to guard your king,” he tells me, and then pulls out a knife. i glance at loki as the not-man swipes me across the arm, and i break the knife. “can you make a bracelet?” 

“to allow for training, yes,” loki drawls, flopping a listless hand. it has the same effect as the handcuffs,so i’m shoved and cut and taught to fight for hours on end while loki and the blue figure watch. when i’m sufficiently bruised, practically stuck to the floor, the humanoid tells the chitauri to take me to brilzal. he patches me up and provides painkillers. thankfully he doesn’t think to draw blood while i’m wearing the handcuffs. loki doesn’t visit while i sleep again. 

my clothes- the ones i’ve been wearing since we were taken from the tornado shelter- are torn, so i’m provided bland gray leggings and a tunic with my next meal. no shoes or underwear. i take what i can get, though, relieved to finally be done with my scratchy jeans and stained t-shirt. my shoes- vans- aren’t as comfortable without socks so i run my torn set under the sink and hang them to dry while i wait for the chitauri to collect me again. 

the humanoid beats me to shit again, but i land a few hits back, so it counts as training to him, i guess. loki seems unimpressed, but i can’t imagine with what. maybe he just wants it over with so i kill his enemy. maybe he’s thinking i can’t do it. still, i get patched up by brilzal and eat and sleep and don’t see another soul except the ones in charge. weeks pass of the same routine; eventually they take my vans so i’m left barefoot, take my old clothes so i sleep in the tunic, take my underwear so i have nothing left of my own belongings. after the last one i knock the humanoid out in one cold blow and bare my teeth at loki, sure he’s bullshitting me and ready to knock him out next. he stands with the same wide eyes, surrounded by perpetual bruise, and declares me ready. 

“your king is somewhat particular when it comes to style,” says another blue man. the chitauri clicks by the door. this blue man doesn’t seem to understand it, and continues to walk in circles around me. i stand on a podium in the tunic and leggings, staring at a giant mirror. my hair is longer, grown out of my hipsterish lob. “if you were going to hala, i would probably put you in something like this, so try it on in case you ever have to go.” he hands me a pile of clothes and doesn’t look away. i bite my lip and try to breathe. 

“do you mind-“ 

“unfortunately, i have to watch you at all times, because all you’ve got is the bracelet.” 

“i can’t remove it,” i grumble, and add, “and i wouldn’t leave; there’s nothing i could even do.” it sucks, but, “even if i left this room i’d never make it out of the palace, so there’s no use trying.” it gets me some privacy. the blue man turns to the chitauri, even though it doesn’t look away. i don’t care as much with the chitauri. it’s a creature. in the bundle is armor and cloth that covers everything but my head, including my neck. i manage most of it, but a few pieces hang awkwardly when i mutter, “okay,” and the man turns around again. he secures the final plates and steps back before returning with a marker of sorts and pins. 

“okay, now carefully take that off and put this on, for battle,” and then i try on something like chain mail, and then a sparse skirt, shirt, and sandals, “because your skin is your defense.” 

“it doesn’t matter where something strikes me if it would pierce my clothes anyways,” i point out. “if i’m shot with a bare arm and shot with a clothed arm, the bullet disintegrates against both.” 

“but with less clothing, we have fewer repairs to do.” 

i frown. “can i at least cover my stomach?” the man sighs and acquiesces. thank fuck. the next outfit is a dress, loose and flowing, and pitch black. the last outfit is made of a material i’m not sure can be replicated on earth that’s stiff and dark and comes with incredibly comfortable shoes. there’s fitted pants and a tucked-in shirt, making me feel like a pirate as i look at myself in the mirror. still, everything is flexible and comfortable. 

“you’ll wear this most of the time,” the blue man explains, pinning and marking. once i’m back in the tunic and leggings, he lays a cloak over me and makes a few more marks and pins before sending me off with the chitauri again. i miss the shoes. i miss my shoes. i miss my family. 

i make sure to drink extra water, feeling the pressure in the back of my throat that always precedes tears. i can’t help it, though. my planet has been invaded by aliens, i’ve lost my entire family and all my belongings, and i have to defend the life of the one responsible for all of it. it’s horrifying; what would my family say if they saw me now? what about my friends, my coworkers, my professors? loki said he wants to restore earth, but i don’t know if i’ll be able to go back to my life pretending i didn’t do this. 

“loki,” i say aloud, once i’m out of sobs to release. i probably look a mess, but i’m impatient. “loki, can you hear me?” nothing. i groan and lie down to sleep. “asshole,” i mutter, as i drift off. 

the last outfit, my pirate costume, arrives with my meal complete with the shoes. i’m escorted- again, read, shoved- to the room that looks like a church, and loki motions me to him. unsure, i step closer until he nods, barely a foot between my knees and his feet. he’s still above me, on a throne on a platform. he still looks dazed and panicked. he looks worse than i feel. 

“kneel,” he mutters, and i do. my head ends up level with his knees. “vanessa robinson,” he starts, and i don’t know where he got my name but i suppose i did know he knew it. from his vision or whatever. “from here on, you are in my employ as my personal bodyguard; lift your hands to me.” i do, and he takes off the handcuffs. “you’ll not leave my side unless i say, now come stand behind my shoulder, here.” he motions, and i stand, stepping between the throne and the humanoid. i stop where loki motions, just behind the throne, off to the side a bit, so i look over his shoulder. he nods, for a moment looking kind of like when he’s visited my room. but the moment passes. 

i feel silly for crying. the position comes with the freedom of my powers, knowledge of all the rules in the air and the ability to bend them. it also comes with seeing what’s happening in the world; i recognize the names of some of the weary politicians forced to their knees in front of loki by a chitauri. often they look at the humanoid with pleading eyes, and then seem to realize he isn’t on their side, and then they look at me, and i can’t do anything to help them. a few inhumans-like me- are led in and trained by the humanoid the same way i have been. he doesn’t train me this time. ben isn’t among them. all day, i stand, but i keep my blood flowing. the vectors are under my thumb, now. i keep my muscles just relaxed enough. gravity is but a calculation. loki was right, i realize, as i manipulate the smallest things that really are huge, are laws. another reason to trust him. or to trust his vision. 

the humanoid yawns in the middle of another politician begging for her life. the president of jamaica. loki sighs and waves, and the chitauri shove the woman back out of the room. she gasps and looks to me, and shrieks, “how can you stand and watch?” the doors slam behind her. loki stands and steps down, turning his head just slightly to catch my eye, so i follow him out of the room along with two chitauri and the two figures always at his side. 

to get to the room i’ve been staying in, it was a short walk without many stairs. now, we step into a quickly moving elevator. i nearly stumble as we pick up speed and then slow down again, unused to the feeling after so many months away from technology. the humanoid, the large blue man, and the chitauri get off, but loki remains. i look to him with a raised brow, but he doesn’t say anything until the elevator door closes again. 

“you’ll be staying in the antechamber of my suite, which is on the top floor,” he explains quietly. “i have a kree chef and housekeeper, so food and clothing shouldn’t be a problem.” 

“what is a kree?” i ask before the doors open again. he blinks at me, surprised for a moment. 

“i suppose it makes sense that you don’t know,” he decides, striding forward once they do. “i’ll get you a book with images of the different races and individuals you’ll likely meet under my employ.” that would have been helpful a while ago. i’m too busy blinking against the sunset in my eyes to thank him, though, as there’s suddenly a million windows. i rush to one, and try to drink it in despite the shock to my eyes, because- “you haven’t seen the sun in almost a year,” loki realizes quietly. i don’t look at him, just gasp at the sight in front of me. trees, birds, red, orange, yellow, green, blue. i never thought i’d cry at beauty, at nature, but i feel my throat tighten now. 

“grapes?” someone asks, having snuck up on me in my daze. i jump, and see yet another blue man. 

“um, okay,” i stilt, and- fuck. the sun, and now something sweet? my eyes well up. i manage to gasp, “thanks,” before grabbing a bunch and turning back to the sun. loki comes up to my other side. 

“are you alright?” he asks quietly. i don’t answer for fear of sobbing. “leave us,” he says, and grabs my elbow when i start to move. “not you,” he corrects. “you’re the only human i can truly ensure the welfare of, vana.” that isn’t a comforting thought. “i take what i can get,” he adds, reminding me of myself. “is there anything you want that i haven’t thought of?” 

that he hasn’t thought of. good catch. not my family, then. “a source of oxygen, like a plant.” looking out at the trees reminds me of freshly mown grass, of playing in the sprinkler, of weeding the garden. loki turns and then hands me a pot, and when i look down, there are tulip leaves. “my favorite flower,” i remark, a habit whenever they come up. but then i blush. loki nods and steps away from the window. i finish the grapes and follow him. leisurely, he shows me his own suite; bedroom, bathroom, dining area, seating, library. then mine, just a bed and a very comfortable bathroom. there’s an armoire and a tub in it, stocked with my tailored clothes and a million soaps and soft towels. 

“dinner’s in only a few minutes, but you can come and go throughout this floor as you please,” loki finally tells me. “you won’t find anything i don’t want you to.” i don’t know how that’s possible, but i nod. he nods back and steps away. 

i turn to the window i now have access to even in sleep. the sky is getting darker. i’m free, though, i’m fucking free; loki could hardly stop me if i broke the window and floated about the earth, wreaking havoc on the chitauri and the blue men and everything until the earth is under human control again. i take a deep breath, tulip leaves just under my nose, and let it out. i wouldn’t do that. they might kill my remaining family. loki’s vision might actually be a better idea. i don’t have the whole picture, still. 

dinner is stew and quiet, and afterwards, loki slips off to his library while i return to my room. the antechamber, he called it. i have no idea what that means, but i return there and sit on the bed for a while. the fact remains that loki has some sort of control over my mind, and that i still don’t have my family, and that my planet has still been invaded and enslaved. or whatever it is that’s happening out there. nathan and ethan are still dead, unless loki is to believed; while i do believe him, it’s while i tell myself that he lies. maybe i’ve been brainwashed. would i consider that possibility if i were? 

when i wake up again, the sun is rising through the window and there’s a book on my chest. scrawled on the front in loopy calligraphy is “vana,” and the same handwriting seems to be throughout. it’s the picture book i was promised. kree are blue and large, thanos is even larger and closer to purple, resembling a raisin if my humor at the picture is right. asgardians look human, but are stronger. the two figures normally at loki’s side are named olzo and traedenn, and olzo is kree. it doesn’t say what traedenn is, but it also doesn’t say he’s human. 

“breakfast,” the chef announces, poking his head into my room before disappearing. i sit beside loki again and eat smoked salmon and boiled eggs and radishes and blueberries. 

“you said i haven’t seen the sun in almost a year,” i murmur, once i’m full and washing the meal down with a mysterious sweet drink. “how long has it been, since the bomb?” i don’t even remember it day it was that we went into the shelter. 

“it happened on the fourth day of may in your calendars, and it’s now the tenth day of april.” i take a deep breath and nod. that’s a long time to be a prisoner. it doesn’t feel like that long, but at the same time, it seems i’ve been living like this for years. my brothers are a distant memory, my parents even more so. i can barely imagine their faces. “hydra has requested an audience with me,” loki changes the subject, “we should go.” so i walk just behind his shoulder. olzo and traedenn are already waiting with the chitauri on their floor. i wonder how long they have to stand in front of the elevator for every morning. 

i don’t know what hydra is until an elderly man introduces himself as gideon malick and bows not out of fear, but reverence. “hydra has been in the service of individuals like you for centuries,” he tells loki. “it’s an honor and a privilege to see the world as it is now, with you in control of it, my king.” 

“you were the ones i had to take the tesseract from,” loki corrects him. 

“we have operated undercover within organizations like shield since the red skull,” malick nods, and then bows again. “the red skull prophesied your coming, my king, and prepared us.” 

loki hums. “not enough.” malick gasps, but doesn’t stop bowing. “gideon malick, i can do research, the internet remains operational,” loki continues to drawl, crossing one leg over the other and flicking a hand dismissively. “you were a businessman with your hand in the pockets of countless politicians, a head of hydra, and a member of the world security council.” he hums again. “now, you come to me with one title, almost a full year after you bombed me with your other title; i also know who sent that missile.” malick gulps and begins to stutter about keeping his cover. “if my rule were prophesied as you say, i would not have met any resistance, especially with a weapon that size, yes?” he keeps blubbering and i think i hear an apology, but loki isn’t even done; “not to mention the avengers, a team of powered people collected for the express purpose of stopping me, led by shield, the organization you’re supposed to be in control of.” 

the avengers? i’ve never heard of that sort of thing, but i’ve also only barely heard of shield; they’re never mentioned, like the nsa or something. that’s probably the goal, too. “the avengers died in the blast,” malick announces, and then waves his arms a bit, “and you didn’t!” 

“because the avengers huddled around the bomb like it would keep them warm in my winter, save thor, who left this dimension entirely!” suddenly loki is shouting, and standing, and stepping down towards malick. “hydra is no ally of mine, nor humanity as you so claim; you have slaughtered in droves; senselessly, needlessly, you have pillaged and raped and murdered, not for me or any other god you believe in, but yourselves.” his voice drops an octave and draws to a growl. “hydra,” he spits, “is the reason humanity is so tortured to need me.” 

“please,” malick gasps, as another figure is brought in and dropped at his side. a woman. “stephanie!” 

“i heard everything, dad,” she snarls back. “you’re a coward.” 

“and you’re no better,” loki interrupts, before malick can defend himself. he turns to the chitauri standing above them. “use them to gather up the rest of hydra, through any means necessary, and then place everyone into one of the holding rooms.” 

“they’ll never believe you, they’ll never come,” malick argues as he’s dragged away. 

“i’m the god of lies, gideon,” loki reminds him. “they will.” he returns quietly to the throne once the doors are closed, and brushes his lips with his fingertips for a few minutes. “have the chitauri continue searching, and are our competitors ready?” 

“a few are, my king,” olzo nods. “enough for ronan, at least; i will call him.” 

“there are other bidders,” traedenn tells loki, when olzo turns away and begins muttering to himself. “richer bidders, out in the stars.” 

“i’ve been accused of what you’re doing, traedenn,” loki murmurs, but the entire conversation is flying over my head. i’m still reeling because hydra, nazi hydra, the hydra that captain america became famous for taking down, has been simmering beneath the surface ever since. and, and- they’ve been operating for centuries. the world security council sounds like a united nations thing, which blows my mind again, because the radio hosts said there were more than seven million people in new york city when the bomb went off. if there was a plan, it backfired. “it wasn’t true then, and it isn’t true now, but at least stick to what you’re good at.” loki’s voice brings me back. 

“he’ll be here in a few of earth’s days,” olzo reports. loki nods, and a few inhumans are dragged into the room. again, i search for ben, and again he isn’t there. i wonder if traedenn bruises. he doesn’t seem to. 

ronan is a kree warlord, i discover after dinner. he holds loyalty to thanos through shared goals and military values. thanos wants half the universe dead. ronan just wants death in general. they go well together, or the opposite, and i flip between their pages of my book while settled in loki’s library. across the room, he writes with an actual feather quill and flips between at least four different books spread across his desk. 

“what are you doing?” i ask, when the calligraphy starts to blur and my hands go a little numb. 

“what one can do is limited by what one knows,” he explains, before lifting a book and showing me the contents. it looks like a cookbook when i squint. “i’m studying magic.” 

“you seem pretty powerful already,” i admit, but then blush. even if we are on the same side, he doesn’t need a bigger head. 

“there is always another more powerful,” loki answers, putting the book back down. “until such an individual strikes me down, i’ll try to stop that from happening.” 

“thanos could kill you,” i conclude, feeling smart for a second. he nods. 

“quite easily, i might add.” 

“what if we lie?” he pauses and looks at me with furrowed brows, slumped shoulders, loose hair. he needs thanos dead, and he’ll return earth to order. he said thanos is the enemy, that he didn’t want this. “what if i just-“ i keep my eyes trained on loki’s, but he looks down at his quill as i find it in my mind. energy, from nowhere, vectors; i do the math. it takes a second, but i send my book over to him and flip to the back page, which is blank, to write, “make it someone else’s fault?” 

“that was the plan, to begin with,” loki starts, slowly. “i forced the avengers to join forces in hopes that they’d see i’m hardly in charge, but they failed.” he stands and strides, still slow, towards the seat i’m in. “in my vision, i saw you dismantle thanos entirely.” 

“none of this feels good.” suddenly i’m on the defense; he’s accusing me of something, i just don’t know what. 

“but you came up with it,” he argues, tilting his head to the side and finally stopping a foot away from me. i feel bare without anything to do but stare at him. “i did, too, but i didn’t put that thought in your head.” 

“so you have been brainwashing me,” i sigh, closing my eyes. it’s almost a relief, that i’d never do any of this if i was in my right mind. 

when i open my eyes again, loki’s expression is dark, but tired. “i’m stretched much too thin to do much more than stop you from attacking me, vana, i wouldn’t give you my evil plans.” 

“you said i wouldn’t find anything you don’t want me to,” i remind him, weakly, “and the bracelet did that just fine.” but i’ve lived a whole life without powers, and a whole life taught to dislike people like loki. it makes some sense that one subject would be easier to influence than the other. i sigh again and rub my eyes, pitching to the side for comfort. “can i have a crisis about mind control without your judgement?” 

“i’m surprised, not proud or disappointed,” loki corrects me. whatever. he crouches slightly so we’re on the same level. “my skills are limited to illusion; your mind is still your own, strange and new as it is to you.” my power has made me trust loki? i doubt that. mostly, i’ve been tricked and brainwashed, and he had a vision about me. “you should study, as well.” 

“fine,” i answer quickly, relieved at the subject change. that’s for me to cry about later, not justify in front of him. “i’ll need some physics textbooks.” he nods and finally stands, stepping back to his seat. i pull my book back to myself and brush away the ink, letting it evaporate until all the proof is gone. make it someone else’s fault. what a terrifying idea. 

i’ve never been much of a troublemaker. yes, i’m the middle child, if the twins are to both be counted as the youngest. i used to act out for attention. again, whatever. now i get attention in numbers from school- or. or i guess i used to. but the fact remains what while i have lied my fair share, have cried and pushed and shoved, i've never given purposeful thought to getting away with murder. just another reason i’ll never get my phd, then. 

ronan the accuser arrives with a fleet, crushing some of the forest. loki mutters to me that there is a large bag to park ships and fleets of ships like ronan’s, with smaller vehicles to travel around the planet with. 

“are the rumors to be believed?” ronan himself asks in the throne room, which has been lined with seating and inhumans to entertain. “did my ancestors achieve what they told us they didn’t?” 

“i wouldn’t invite you here if it wasn’t worth your time, ronan, your approval is as valuable as one of the black order,” loki replies easily, smoothly. ronan is mostly covered, but he shows a few kree features in his voice and shadowed eyes. “i’ve been utilizing terrigen crystals for months, and traedenn and olzo here have been responsible for their combat training.” 

“the inhumans were bred to be weapons,” ronan nods, looking around at the men and women and children in gray leggings and gray tunics. “can they not already fight?” 

“few midgardians are warriors,” loki tells him. “they’ve relied heavily on explosives for about a thousand years.” ronan hums, close to a grunt, and steps up to one of the inhumans. his armor is so dark it doesn’t seem to shine in the light. “based on how they’ve been performing, olzo and traedenn have prepared a tournament to show you what the inhumans can do.” 

“to the death?” 

“if that is your recommendation,” loki says, but then adds, “i would like to keep the numbers up to show the black order.” ronan looks closely at a few inhumans and then nods. 

“just show me, then, and i’ll tell you if you should show them.” 

“very well,” loki declares, standing. he steps down to a sprawling table of food, and ronan sits beside him. their chairs are at equal heights, i notice, as ronan notices me and looks me over. loki clears his throat. “my bodyguard is inhuman as well, but it wouldn’t be an entertaining fight.” before ronan can ask why, loki motions and the first two inhumans are shoved towards each other with their handcuffs removed. 

when traedenn trains with the inhumans in front of loki and me, they’re not always given bracelets like i was. some can read minds, or bend impossibly, or make the air shake; skye, she said her name was. she increases the resonant frequency of whatever she gestures at until it breaks, but usually ends up with a bloody nose herself. the tournament runs for hours. i start to get bored, but the i realize when he steps into the ring that ben is here. ben, finally, ben, i can breathe; i have to watch him get beat up again, this time by a child who can jump twelve feet in the air, but i get to see him. he sees me too, though, and freezes. the child lands on his head, but he shakes them off, continuing to stare at me. 

i haven’t cried in a while, that’s why i am now, i think. 

“what is this?” ronan asks. “none of the others have been so distracted.” 

“this is benjamin robinson, one of my bodyguard’s brothers; the others are dead,” loki answers. “it’s understandable they’d be eager to see each other, allow me to make him forget for a moment.” he waves a hand and ben’s eyes glaze over. he turns back to the child with a blink, collects the kinetic energy in his hand, knocks them out. he doesn’t look back at me. it hurts, it does, it fucking hurts; every time i think it can’t get worse. every fucking time, i’m wrong. though the tears welled up in my eyes, i see ronan move, and i crush the metal in my hand before i even realize he’s pulled a knife or that i’ve grabbed it. when i blink, it’s dust. i step back and swipe at my cheeks. 

“it seems she isn’t as easily preoccupied,” ronan muses, hand frozen in the air with half a blade. “impressive power, what is it?” 

“invulnerability,” loki answers smoothly, frowning, “though i would have told you if you asked.” 

“we both know you can hardly be harmed by a dagger,” ronan defends, and looks back at me, tilts his head. “i’d like to see more of it.” he nods, and a few of the kree he came with step into the ring. loki looks like he’s barely holding back an eye roll, but motions for me to join them, and throws in a few chitauri. i try to control my breathing, but i’m kind of having a shitty day- the first kree soldier swings at me, and i catch his blade on my arm, damaging my dress but dissolving his blade so the severed half clatters to the ground. 

i glance at loki between familiar shoves from the chitauri. i’m not just on the defense this time, traedenn made sure of that. so i strike back. the chitauri fall fairly easily, stronger in numbers and against unarmed humans. the kree hold up a few more hits, including a nasty punch to my eye, so i break the glove and some skin before the soldier can pull away. he helps, and i punch him back. offense. 

“good,” i hear traedenn remark, over the battle cries of the kree i’m fighting. but that’s hardly a compliment; instead i snarl. it takes some concentration to not use gravity to my advantage. eventually, the kree are down, panting, one with a broken leg and the other with unfocused eyes. i hold myself up with gravity even though i feel like how ethan once described his panic attacks. 

“i have to disagree with you, loki, that was an entertaining fight,” ronan announces as i return to my place just behind loki. 

“go to brilzal, vanessa,” loki orders, then offers the same to ronan’s warriors. brilzal gives me painkillers as he usually does, and rubs a salve onto my definitely bruising eye. he also gives me something that miraculously sets my lungs back into working order. 

“what the hell’d you give me,” i mumble, cherishing the feel of measured breath again. 

“a terran medicine, but it will backfire and cause dysfunction if taken too often, so i’ll likely never give it to you again,” brilzal snaps back, bandaging the soldiers. “what the hell did you do to end up like that?” he doesn’t seem to care that the soldiers are listening intently. for a long few moments i wish loki would appear again so i could figure out what to say, but he doesn’t. 

“just a little winded from the fight, i wasn’t raised to become this,” i answer finally. the soldiers nod. brilzal swipes away the salve so my face is clean again and hands me a mirror. i totally have a black eye. “should i put on some makeup?” i ask the soldiers. they shake their heads. or, the one with the broken leg shakes his head. the other doesn’t do much. the kree are huge, but it seems i did some damage. 

when we return to the throne room, ronan is standing, ready to leave. i step to just behind loki’s shoulder as i’m supposed to, and thankfully don’t find ben in a cursory scam of the room. it would hurt too much to see him without his recognition again. it hurts to not see him, too, and it hurt the most for him to see me posted behind loki. there’s no positive. 

“the black order will be as impressed as i am, especially with skye, was her name?” ronan nods to himself. “earth has gone quietly for too long, but it seems you don’t need my help.” 

“i’ve already received it,” loki nods with a polite smile. “thank you, ronan.” the throne room clears out, and loki and i return to his suite in time to see the ships lifting off, setting a small fire amongst the fallen trees. “i’m sorry,” he mutters, turning away from the window and walking towards his library. i reel for a moment, then scoff. 

“sorry, what?” i demand, not voicing the million things he’s done to wrong me and my planet. “what are you apologizing for?” 

“don’t push it.” 

“you know what you did, but you can really say sorry about your crimes against like, all of humanity,” i tell him, “so that leads me to believe you’re sorry for making my brother forget who i am?” as if that’s the only thing he’s done today. “or maybe having me fight two kree warriors and three chitauri, or maybe ordering me around?” i limit it to today and stop, hands in the air. “what exactly do you mean?” 

loki is quiet for a while, and i follow him into his library when he goes. “about your brother, i’m sorry,” he finally says. “it was temporary, and the rest of your family is safe and well, unlike what i said earlier.” 

“i have no reason to believe that,” i point out, but sit and pick up a textbook. classical electrodynamics, written about fifty years ago. “but apologizing is good, so thanks.” logically. loki’s lips thin in the corner of my eye. i don’t say anything more, though. the chef serves swedish meatballs and a tea-like drink in the dining room. 

the routine makes a comeback. inhumans train, politicians whine and beg, members of hydra are found and locked away. i don’t blame loki for holding that grudge. if i could lock him and all the other alien invaders away, i would. but here i am, serving them, instead. a job worse than retail. didn’t seriously think that existed, not that i’m getting paid. 

the black order is thanos’ collection of orphans that he has created. on each planet he conquers, he halves the population and raises a child as his own to fight for him. loki contacts them slowly, one or two at a time, at their convenience, and many of them do have similar reactions to ronan’s. maybe not as passionate- ronan is obsessed with kree tradition- but they do recognize the power and potential that the inhumans show them. little do they know that inhumans are a minority on earth. 

“here’s what we don’t understand,” proxima midnight tells loki, speaking for corvus glaive as well. “you were a prince of asgard, but after my father took you under his wing, you decided to farm kree descendants on earth?” 

“i was king of asgard, actually,” loki smiles, his polite and sociable laugh. “my brother thor didn’t seem to like this, and returned from exile to cast me off of the bifrost.” the couple nods like they know he’s bulshitting but they want their answers. “i’ve had my eye on midgard for a little while, as it seemed so disorderly, so i’ve only given them a stronger leader to follow, and the inhumans are simply for your father’s benefit.” they nod again, satisfied. “a few kree were more than happy to join me in that service, including olzo.” ben doesn’t fight again, but i do. nearly every time. it’s another few months, nearly fall, by the time all of thanos’ children have been wined and dined. 

for a while, it gets harder to hold back my power, the more i learn. i gain the urge to change things, to twist reality. but eventually it fades, because i’m not allowed to. all i have to do is kill thanos, and then i have to find some way to live in the aftermath. maybe i’ll just stay with loki. at least he’s pretty. he probably put that thought in my head, though. 

“what happened, in new york?” i ask, when the textbook in front of me swims a bit. i don’t close it, so i can pretend i’m still working, but i look over at loki. he licks his lip and sighs. 

“i used a spear that thanos gave me and the tesseract to assemble a portal for the chitauri to invade earth.” he pauses and throws down his quill. “the avengers fought me, including my brother thor, but it couldn’t be stopped, so the world security council sent a nuclear missile to stark tower, where the tesseract was.” he grimaces. “i moved the portal here, along with the tesseract and the spear, but the avengers weren’t so selfish; most of them died.” faintly, i remember him mentioning thor. “thor disappeared, i don’t know how or why or where to; odin hasn’t done anything about this whole thing, and no one from asgard has any comment to make.” 

“odin, the king of asgard,” i guess. it wasn’t in my book. loki nods, so i continue, “and after, you rounded up everyone still alive?” 

“the chitauri operate with a hive mind, and multiply quickly, so i set them to making a space in what you australia for every mortal on earth to stay,” he nods. “you passed through there, and, as i understand it, were separated from your parents?” got it in one. “traedenn is from a nearly extinct race reacted alongside inhumans a long time ago to guide them; there are maybe a hundred like him left in the universe, spread out and dying; two reside on midgard, in my service.” traedenn and the one that sorted us in the middle of the night. “traedenn is a skilled fighter, the other able to detect an individual capable of surviving terrigenesis.” i don’t ask about ethan and nathan. “your parents are safe.” 

“what about the radiation?” i ask, leaning back in my seat and imagining the globe. it’s there, i realize suddenly, and pull back to my own self in loki’s suite. “is there a way of clearing it?” 

“an expensive one, but yes; before we make an audience with thanos, it’ll be done.” he licks his lip and again and presses one fingertip to the seam of his frown. “still, that area will be heavily damaged, and i’m not sure we’ll have the chitauri on our side.” 

little did i know, i’d be tossed out into space. we take one of the vehicles from the palace to the place loki mentioned, a parking lot with a couple dozen structures scattered around. i don’t know how any of them would manage flight, but loki and i board one. there’s kree chatter inside that dims with his entrance. 

“my king,” one man greets him, bowing, “we have a viewing deck for your pleasure.” loki just nods, and happily sits in the large seat he’s offered. a replacement throne. there are no other seats around, as traedenn and olzo are with the inhumans elsewhere on the ship, ensuring they’re ready to face their “true ruler.” i’m in my hala uniform. there’s pressure in the air that i can taste, but not feel. 

“you might want to sit, vana,” loki murmurs, after a few minutes of standing and staring at the other ships through the glass. i blink and look around the room, but still, there’s nowhere else to sit. my mouth is open to say this when i notice loki has pressed himself to the side of his seat, more than enough room for me to share it. he arches a graceful brow. my heart races, but fine. whatever. i sit, and he relaxes, so our thighs are pressed together, his arm behind my shoulders. when he breathes, i can feel it, not just logically but against my armor. 

“how do any of these ships fly?” i ask, desperate for a subject change. my heart rate doesn’t slow. 

“i have no clue,” he answers quietly. i close my eyes and remember earth, see the planet as suddenly as i did before. in my body, my breath speeds, but i keep looking. the radiation, i can find it; but new york has been cleaned up, and the power plants remain in operation. i can feel the plates shift just barely, see everest rise a bit higher, and then my body jerks. we’ve lifted off. i keep my eyes closed and search the ship for any rules, anything that makes sense. but loki was right; i don’t know what i’m looking for. so i grip the seat and open my eyes to watch the ground get farther away. for all my awareness, it takes me a moment to realize i’ve grabbed loki’s thigh, as well. i jump and lean away, but get distracted by the sight of clouds and birds and then suddenly, the planet is below us. 

“fucking hell,” i gasp, and go to stand, get a closer look, but loki’s hand lands on my shoulder. he shakes his head but doesn’t say anything. great, i’m about to complain, when the ship jerks again and suddenly we’re jumping, pressing through something i can’t describe, like water and air and a vacuum. i feel swollen, crushed, heart and lungs working overtime when it’s over. but it feels like it lasts for hours. eventually my head stops spinning, and i realize i’m draped all over loki. but i’m too shaken to move. 

“rest and breathe for a moment,” he whispers. i just groan. 

“my king, we’ve arrived,” one of the kree announces, stepping into the room, and i jump slightly but loki holds me down. there’s a green shimmer in the room. he doesn’t speak, but i hear his voice acknowledge the news. he pulls an apple from nowhere, holding it out for me, and after i eat it the core disappears in a green flash. magic, i guess. 

“can you stand?” loki asks under his breath. the kree soldier is waiting. i use gravity to lift myself and walk to where i’m supposed to be. the green shimmer fades, and the soldier doesn’t seem at all confused by my actions- maybe he didn’t see anything at all. that would be good for my dignity. “send word that we’re here, and follow the docking instructions you receive,” loki tells him. the glass is engulfed in shadow as we approach what i can guess is thanos’ ship. i can’t see the entire thing, and for the moment, i don’t want to risk using too much power. maybe thanos has a sense about it. at this thought, i stop using gravity to hold myself up and instead rely on my shaky knees. loki checks on me with an arched brow, but doesn’t say anything, so i don’t either. i just follow him off the ship and slowly regain my strength by stretching my legs. 

thanos’ ship is dark. i blink to see, but even then i don’t see much, just loki a foot or so in front of me. “loki, of asgard, welcome back,” a low voice greets him, strong and full of gravel. 

“thanos,” loki replies smoothly and bows. i mimic him nervously. what if i fuck it up? what if i’ve already fucked it up? we’ll both die, or maybe i’ll mostly die, and then humanity is as doomed as it has been for over a year. more so, then. “i’ve brought with me two hundred kree and six hundred inhumans, as well as a volknar.” 

“i appreciate the formality,” thanos replies, stepping into my line of sight. or, range of sight. he’s huge, way bigger than the book made him seem, and definitely more- more something. the image was an illustration, after all, so it didn’t fully encapsulate the wrinkles and eerie eyes. “who stands with you?” 

“vanessa here showed great promise as a bodyguard after terrigenesis, so i decided to bring her under my wing,” loki explains, a tight but polite smile pulling at his lips as he gestures to me. thanos nods and steps closer, easily twice my height. 

“my children mentioned an inhuman named skye, why not have her at your side?” 

loki turns back to thanos and doesn’t skip a beat. “skye is strong, yes, and holds potential beyond many others i’ve been witness to,” he placates, “but vanessa here is invulnerable, and responded impressively well to combat training.” 

“invulnerable?” 

“we can’t take blood tests, as her skin defends against many materials, though she is able to dress,” he continues. “we’ve lost many a weapon to her, and the kree scientist brilzal has not found a limit yet.” his eyes twinkle as he gestures to me again and turns to thanos with a wider grin. “she’s proven to be unwavering in her duties.” i’m being complimented, commented on, but on nothing i’m proud of, so i tune the conversation out as thanos continues to remark on the uniform and how the other inhumans have fared. we walk further into the darkness as they talk for a few minutes, eventually emerging where a few of the more powerful inhumans have been pitted against the black order. the black order is winning, obviously. i take in everything with my eyes, as dim as it is, not willing to risk using my power when thanos is literally feet away from me and i’m not ready to act yet. to kill him. 

i’m about to commit murder. fuck. 

and loki is no help; he continues to chat with thanos, the thanos he wants me to kill, the very thing i’ve been preparing for months to do. loki doesn’t even look at me or provide a vision or anything to offer support. everyone seems so comfortable, and i know i’m supposed to destroy it all, but i’m human. it’s wrong to kill, to ruin someone’s day, to destroy. how would we get back to earth, even? i forgot to ask for more details before we left. fuck, fuck, fuck. i forgot to consider that even though thanos is supposed to be the bad guy, it’s still me, killing someone else. thanos isn’t a house centipede. 

“i would like to see vanessa fight one of the other inhumans, to see what you saw,” his suggestion cuts through my heavy breaths. loki squints at me for a moment, nodding. “maybe that one?” 

he points. i step into the ring as the black order and the inhumans step out. and then. my vision blurs and i think, maybe the alien invasion hasn’t been very good for my health, because i feel like i’m having another panic attack. every time i think i can’t get worse. ben blinks owlishly at me, and stumbles forward, but i jerk back. i want to say no. i want to stop thanos. this wasn’t part of the plan. 

“oh, did ronan tell you?” loki asks him with thinly veiled nerves. i stopped ronan through my tears last time, but i can’t just do this. 

“ben,” i whisper, jerking back again when my little brother tries to hug me again. “ben, i-” 

“he suggested your bodyguard was more focused than her brother,” thanos replies. i shake my head and jerk back again, swipe at my tears. “do you agree?” loki says humans aren’t raised to fight and i try to pretend ben isn’t already sobbing because he hasn’t seen me in months and now i won’t touch him. thanos insinuates that i’m unfit if i can’t face my own blood; his children spar all the time. “this invulnerability extends to flesh?” loki reminds him of brilzal’s findings. 

how do i make this fight the least painful? ben’s power ensures that he can take force and turn it into light energy, so the only logical way to defeat him is to break down some of his skin cells, but he’s my brother. i know he’ll recover- he has to recover. but i don’t want to do it. no words come to mind to talk me out of it. but, the kree soldiers i fought- that’s it! i broke one’s leg with force without tearing through his armor. maybe ben has to be intentional with his power? 

“ben, hit me,” i whisper, and he shakes his head. “hit me,” i tell him, but try to keep quiet. “everything’s going to be fine, and it can’t really get worse, can it?” we both know it can, but he swings, finally. again and again, and then he burns my arm with pent up energy, and then i have a couple holes in my hala uniform, but as if i give a fuck about that. traedenn taught both of us how to fight, so i feel like i’m training with him again; the same punches, but at a different height. we go in circles for a few minutes, and i just try to look tough while showing my supposed invulnerability and make the fight end quickly. it’s a distracting goal to have, especially when i have to face my one remaining family member knowing how i’ve betrayed him. 

“what’s your power?” ben asks, through a punch that i dodge. “my shirt’s falling apart.” 

“i break everything i touch,” i tell him, not a lie, “and i can’t be cut.” 

“why were you next to him?” 

“same reason we’re here,” i pant, again, not a lie. “he wanted it.” ben nods but doesn’t look like he trusts me. he’s right not to, which pisses me off. “wonder what i got on that paper,” i ask out loud suddenly, and flip him. he groans, and for a second i’m worried i messed up. maybe i accidentally used gravity, or broke his back, or broke anything at all. my baby brother. 

“get him a weapon,” thanos calls. a chitauri weapon is thrown into the ring, but ben is hesitant to pick it up. 

“vana,” ben protests, but i point at it and nod. he rolls to his feet and swings the thing experimentally. he’s just a fucking kid. “are you sure about this?” i hold my fists up instead of saying anything and nod again. he swings. it doesn’t come anywhere near me. “sorry,” he gasps, and swings again, and i can tell he’s going to miss again, so i step into the metal’s path. ben gasps again, but i break the metal down to flakes, turned slightly so thanos can see. that’s what all of this about, right? proving to thanos that i’m all defense. 

“again,” thanos prompts. ben complies and i break the metal. when i glance over, thanos is closer and narrowing his eyes at me. “how about that,” he muses, “you were right.” finally. finally finally finally, we’re dismissed. but i have to return to loki’s side, and ben has to return to the other inhumans. still, i sigh out of relief and try to pretend like it’s a regular tuesday and that i travel to space and nearly kill my brother while preparing to kill someone else. still, i’m terrified that thanos has me figured out, knows my true power. will he be able to stop me? 

if i were a politician, or a royal, or someone with a purpose and dignity and notability, i might think it’s a whole set up to make me try to kill thanos, only for loki to stop me and laugh in my face, pulling at the strings in my mind. but i’m one inhuman among, today, six hundred. i hardly can be held to any standard. thanos and the black order already think i’m a weak human pumped up with terrigen mist. loki, in fact, is the only alien who’s ever trusted me at all. not very much, but some. i could squeal, tell thanos what he’s been plotting. yeah, i’d die, but maybe not. i can shape the words on my tongue, so loki isn’t really stopping me. 

the black order decides to spar throughout the room, not limited to a ring anymore. this is a perfect opportunity, but it does risk everything. no one comes up to us, and thanos doesn’t move. there’s no easy transition to murder. i take a deep breath, and look around the room. just with my eyes. inhumans wail and growl in their fights. i watch feet slide back and forth, and most of all, i watch the weapons. that’s the ticket. then i watch everyone’s faces as i start to look at the weapons in my mind’s eye, calculating vectors. the ship’s gravity is the same as earth’s, which makes my math easier. thanos doesn’t stutter in his quiet commentary to loki, and no one looks at me. traedenn is in the corner, so i figure the other of his kind is back on earth. no one seems to sense my power. 

i school my features, continue to look around the room as i watch the black order’s movements. nebula has taken to throwing her opponents until they fall unconscious. she seems the weakest fighter, more prone to error, probably because she’s so disfigured. i wait until she throws her baton, and change a few of the vectors, mess with the force; thanos throws a hand up, but his reflexes are too relaxed for someone in a room full of enslaved inhumans. the baton lodges in his throat, up against the spine, and buzzes. in my body, i react, jumping when loki does, stepping between my alien overlord and his alien overlord as i’m expected to do. nebula screams. she was rude, when she visited. not that any of the black order weren’t. but she screams because after killing thanos, i’m responsible for her death at the hands of the rest of the black order. proxima midnight runs up to thanos and pulls out the baton, but she’s way too late. 

i heat up thanos’ brain a bit, like the baton would if it were a little more powerful. nothing unbelievable, but nothing he could come back from. 

proxima midnight swings at me, probably because i’m standing the closest, but i break her spear when it strikes my side, holding up the facade. loki tugs me towards the inhumans. “he’s dead,” she announces. “who will wear the gauntlet in his stead?” slowly, she pulls off the golden glove thanos has been wearing. “why didn’t he use it?” she whispers to herself, but then holds up the glove, revealing that it has six slots for gems, two of which are filled. i reach out to them and wonder, too, why thanos didn’t use their power. maybe because he couldn’t. they seem like regular rocks, but they whisper to me, sounding like my own power, though infinitely more terrifying. 

they are still gems. i can move them. so i do. proxima’s hands are empty and burning before she realizes, replaced with liquid gold. the gems, i send off into space and hope no one finds them again. i bury one in the core of a nearby planet, the other in a star. they aren’t affected by the conditions, nor are their surroundings affected by them. 

“the universe has decided, then,” gamora pipes up, standing from nebula’s corpse. i try not to look at it. “what do we do now?” 

“if you have no plans for midgard, i can take care of it,” loki suggests. “you are all still my allies.” gamora thanks him. did we do it, then? all loki has to do now is hold up his end of the bargain. the black order is powerful, yes, but less so without thanos, and especially less so without those gems. they seem done talking for now, so the inhumans are shuffled back onto the kree ship, and loki and i squeeze into his seat again. 

we don’t say anything. we return to earth, and i throw up, and we don’t say anything. i stumble going back to the palace and loki puts a shimmer in the air. no one notices me. still, he doesn’t say a word until we’re in his suite and i’ve collapsed on my bed. 

“my king?” the chef stutters, as the green shimmer is gone now. but he’s seen us study together, so returning from space travel with loki holding me up isn’t too incriminating. 

“she didn’t respond well to travel,” loki explains, barely scratching the surface of what’s wrong with me. “get a bucket and some way to transport her to brilzal.” the chef nods quickly and leaves. “vana,” loki prompts me. 

“did i do it?” i ask, because i’m sure, but at the same time not. 

“i don’t know,” he answers, feeding the unsure side. “it didn’t look like my vision, so i’ll hold up the illusion while i reconstruct things, as the radiation is clear.” 

“okay,” i sigh, and close my eyes. i’m back on earth. i lived. so far, things are running smoothly. “okay, fuck.” loki just frowns, and then lifts me onto a stretcher or something with the chef, and together they push me to the elevator. he was right, i do need the bucket after the elevator jerks to a stop. brilzal sounds wrung out when i’m transferred onto his table, but there’s definitely a moment that i lose to unconsciousness. i blink while a bright light is directed at my eyes. 

“i can’t give her more of the terran medicine, so i’ll need ishromkade and talda weed,” brilzal orders, as loki puts my bracelet on. i notice, though, through the fog of whatever illness i have, that it’s a prop. “thank you, my king, i don’t want to lose any limbs while i treat her.” brilzal speaks quickly and without much breath. i retch again and then close my eyes and sigh. either brilzal or loki squeezes my hand, but i don’t care to look, deciding instead to remain in my body. grounded to earth. as it should be. 

i choke on some bitter leaves as they’re shoved down my throat, but when i drift into consciousness again, i feel a hell of a lot better. 

“please don’t make me leave earth ever again,” i groan, in case anyone’s in the room. i hear a laugh, but don’t fully recognize it. when i open my eyes, brilzal smiles down at me and places a hand on my shoulder. “he made me stand while we traveled faster than light,” i tell the kree, who just laughs again. 

“it’s good to see you safe, vanessa,” he tells me with a smile, which i appreciate. i did forget about him earlier, didn’t i? loki hasn’t been the only alien to trust me. brilzal does, too. or, he likes me. i think. he’s nice, if anything. and the other kree, who dressed me, trusted me then. was loki brainwashing me on thanos’ ship? i take the water that brilzal offers. maybe he did it to make sure i didn’t chicken out. that wouldn’t make it any less wrong, though. 

i sleep for a while in loki’s suite, waking when the sun rises in my window and shines right in my eyes. the chef serves breakfast, but loki remains in his library while i eat. it makes me nervous. when i step in, there’s a map of new york city spread across the table. 

“i’ve never been,” i remark and sit in my usual chair. 

“i’ve appealed to the kree, and they like the idea of expanding to this planet, shaping it to their standards.” he sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “it will be difficult to get them to leave, though, and they’ll want more inhumans.” 

“i don’t think you can fully restore the status quo,” i suggest, thinking as i speak. “everything is so different, now, and everything we know has been dismantled; if you threw me back into the earth of five years ago, i wouldn’t know what to do with myself.” 

“so i find a peaceful middle that satisfies the kree and dignifies humans.” i make a face; those two statements don’t really fit together. the kree are technologically advanced, yes, but their moral compass as a species is just demonic. just because brilzal was nice to me doesn’t mean he thinks of me as anything above a science experiment. “some planets live at peace while being part of the empire, and it would provide some protection from other interested parties.” 

“how do you ensure that a caste system isn’t put in place?” loki frowns, clearly confused. “a class system, like kree at the top, then inhumans, then humans, and the humans shovel garbage all day but at least they get to live.” i mime my words, then add, “we don’t like those here, even though they happen all the time.” 

“usually based on skin color,” loki fills in, and pulls a book off one of the shelves. “there was,” he starts to mutter to himself, so i pick up one of my textbooks and relax. 

but i think i’ve already made my decision. i can’t go back to my family, even if they are still alive. i’m a murderer; i can’t face them. i want to, but it feels wrong. so i keep reading about wormholes and dimensions to try and get thor back. the routine makes a comeback. the kree colonizers arrive and begin construction, thankfully avoiding the greenery. 

traedenn is sparring with skye when a kree soldier rushes into the room and announces the arrival of the black order. it’s only another moment before they walk through the door. loki stands, eyes wide again like they haven’t been in weeks. wisely, traedenn handcuffs the inhuman and drags her out of the room. 

“loki of asgard,” ebony maw declares, “come with us.” but for a second, loki hesitates. he glances at me and steps forward, a clear prompt to follow, but maw continues, “you won’t be needing a bodyguard.” so i stop short. loki nods and does as he’s asked. 

i can’t tell, as they lift off, if thanos has returned. i reach out to the ship and follow it out of earth’s atmosphere, squeeze my eyes shut and watch it accelerate impossibly. past the speed of light. but i still find it. i can’t feel my body, but i can feel another planet. i can’t truly see it, not with color. it’s like a topographic map, or a temperature diagram, wind and dust. i make out the shapes of bodies, matching thanos’ measurements. the ship lands and the passengers step off, but i can’t tell them apart. 

sound hits the wind, without really making any sense. it has volume and shape that mean nothing without my ears there. i am without a body, observing the fine details of a planet too far away to fathom. the figures gather around one of the thanos-shaped corpses, and more sound is sent out. i wish i could understand; is it thanos they stand over, or a planet full of him? i look closer, and closer still, blocking out the planet to search the corpse, and see the same fried brain that i left. so it is him. 

thanos is dead. i did it. i killed him. 

there is wind on his face, pressure, dust, and sound. light, too. i break more of his brain and insides as the figures are huddled around him, and then change the dust to wear down at his skin, leaving him dry and empty and dead, so dead. there is more sound, and then the planet beneath him moves and swallows him up, burying him. so i break thanos down to his most basic pieces and send them throughout the planet. under the ground, they move in the gaps between rocks, between electrons. i watch the figures when i’m done, but the number remains the same; loki is either still with them or dead on the ship. i try to look closer, to find out, find his drawn-up shoulders and his tight frown and his graceful hands and his wide eyes. 

but i open my own eyes because my body is lifted from the floor in the throne room, brilzal shouting at the chitauri that handle me. the bracelet is on, that’s why i was pulled from the planet. too quickly, though. i see the high ceiling, but i’m not really grounded to anything. brilzal forces more leaves down my throat as the chitauri move me. i groan and shut my eyes, trying to reacquaint myself with my own body. the planet was too far away, i stepped out of it completely. maybe i’m like ethan or nathan, unable to survive with my power. 

i sleep, but i’m not sure how long it is before i see brilzal again, shuffling around his lab. when he notices i’ve blinked awake, he rushes over with a glass of water. 

“loki’s back, if you fainted because of his absence,” he tells me. i frown and keep drinking, then stop to gasp for breath, exhausted. “you two have grown quite close.” i don’t love that idea, but i don’t say anything. brilzal nods and goes back to whatever work he was doing. “i’ll have to let him know you’re awake.” 

“you won’t,” responds loki, materializing in the middle of the room. “vanessa, how are you feeling?” 

“tired,” i answer simply. 

“that’s funny,” loki smiles, but it’s not a pleased smile. “you’ve slept for more than a full day.” brilzal quietly agrees. “what did you do?” 

“didn’t you see?” i ask, because i couldn’t really follow who and what and how when i was so busy stretching my power to previously unexplored lengths. “your- i mean.” 

loki sighs and shuts his eyes for a moment, bites his lip. “can allosh also provide what it is you’re doing here?” he asks brilzal, who nods, clearly bewildered. “then let’s get you to your chamber.” he doesn’t continue until we’ve shuffled awkwardly out of the elevator. “my vision came to pass, but not as i expected.” 

“i dismantled thanos,” i provide, “and spread him throughout the planet he was on.” 

“that is what i saw, and it is what i have been seeing for years, but i didn’t consider that he might have already been dead when it came to pass,” he tells me. “i thought i saw you kill thanos, but i actually saw you perform his funeral from another solar system.” 

“it’s all over then?” i clarify. “the kree are building on earth, and eventually humans will move back into their homes.” loki nods. for a minute, i breathe a little easier. “but it isn’t all over.” 

“there remain some complicating factors, yes, but the chitauri remain under my command, and the clock for reintegration is on mere weeks.” but not everyone is on earth. thor is missing, and loki has yet to confirm the survival of my family. he seems to realize this, and summons a few books, setting them to the floor beside my bed. “when we visited thanos’ ship, i have you an apple,” he starts. i barely remember, but sure. “it was in a pocket dimension until i called to it, frozen in time.” 

“is that where you sent the inhumans?” 

“i concealed them while an inhuman named gordon teleported them to safety in a colony on the far side of the moon,” he finally answers. “they’ll return once inhumans have integrated; this is about thor.” 

“oh, yeah,” i grumble, “who cares that i have no real idea what happened to my brothers, fuck that,” and pick up a book. “calling an apple is probably a little easier than calling your brother, i assume?” 

“yes,” loki snaps, probably bearing my accusation, but i can’t blame him for being biased towards his family. “once i find a viable dimension, i have to search the entire universe for him, and then the same with the next one, until i find him.” 

“i can make that easier by being able to reach other planets,” i fill in, but loki blinks in surprise and lets out a sharp breath. “someone’s off their game; as long as brilzal doesn’t stop me like that again, i probably can safely come back from a search.” i hate to dim the growing light in his eyes, but i add, “the only thing is, i couldn’t see or hear anything on the planet you went to.” 

“how did you know it was thanos?” i explain the footprint i left in the alien’s brain. “maybe if- thor is an aesir, and incredibly powerful, so if you spend some time comparing an aesir to other life forms- yes.” i motion for him to slow down and explain, but he’s already stood up and remarked that though he probably is a criminal in odin’s eyes, frigga might come around. because his mother and father are both aesirs. 

“aren’t you also an aesir, if your entire family is?” i interrupt. loki stops suddenly, completely. he stares at the wall for a few minutes without saying anything. “loki?” he jumps slightly and turns back to me, now with a carefully neutral expression. 

“your book,” he mutters, and retrieves it and a chair before sitting at my bedside. i recline and sigh, still drained and thrown off by the use of my power. loki flips through the worm pages swiftly, landing on a new page; he’s taken to adding them with magic. “the jotunn,” he reads, holding it so i can see. but i close my eyes. “on asgard, they were called frost giants; inhabitants of the frozen wasteland of jotunheim, large, humanoid beings.” he stops for a moment and lets the book drop, probably on his lap. “i was raised to despise and fear their markings, their scarlet eyes, their deep blue skin, their appetite for destruction and the cold.” another thud, maybe him closing the book. “their ruler was laufey, a warlord, stopped only by odin and, admittedly, myself; i killed him and severed the tentative peace between jotunheim and asgard, leaving the frost giants to dwindle in numbers and power.” 

“why?” i blurt, but then tell him he doesn’t have to answer. 

“i had just learned of my true origin, that i was left to die as an infant; left to die because i was laufey’s runt.” 

i open my eyes again, surprised; all this time, he’s acted as a disgraced prince, and i suppose that’s still true even if he isn’t from asgard. “so-“ my brain tries to form a few different possibilities- “so you didn’t know you were from jotunheim, and when you did, you killed your biological father?” he nods, but doesn’t look back at me. “who raised you, then?” that’s the right question. 

“odin and frigga, as their own, but not quite as honored as thor,” he explains. “frigga taught me magic to make up for my inconvenient birthright, and odin kept me in his home to be used if the need arose.” i make a face, and he must see it out of the corner of his eye because he continues, “that was my reaction as well.” 

“okay, so you’re not an aesir because you’re a jotunn, but thor is an aesir, so where can we find one?” 

finally, loki looks down at me with a frown. he opens the book without looking and finds another page, this time on the aesir. “don’t you want to see?” he asks, though. it takes me a second because i’m so tired. 

“oh, um, i am a scientist, or i was.” 

loki nods, and then his pale complexion begins to melt into a grey, almost blue; the flat planes of his face and his sharp cheekbones, developing deep grooves in a pattern i can’t quite make sense of. he grows just the slightest bit in the chair, head a little higher, fingers a little longer. i study his hands from my perspective laying down and find the same pattern running across his knuckles. i don’t look with my mind’s eye, but it’s tempting. with his brow flat and his hair loose, dry, he looks- the only word for it is- beautiful. lastly, he opens his eyes, dark lashes fluttering to shadow the deep red. it isn’t like many other species’ eyes; instead of distinct pupils, irises, and whites, it’s all a blend of a sharp, bloody scarlet. 

“vana?” he asks, and his teeth are the same, funny enough. his lips are darker. i almost forget that he just did magic, because i’m caught up thinking he looks so fucking cool, and then brilzal’s words strike me. you two have grown quite close. “i-“ he starts to flush with his previous skin color. 

“no, wait,” i protest, and the color recedes. “you look-“ i don’t really know what to say without embarrassing myself. “i don’t know how to describe it, but i wasn’t raised to hate blue men, and now that i do, you don’t look like the kree,” i tell him. “and you definitely don’t look like the chitauri, either.” ha ha. i’m so funny. he doesn’t laugh. “you look like a superhero, it suits you.” 

“a superhero?” he seems almost offended. i think about backtracking, but no. 

“yeah, we killed thanos together, after all, and you are rebuilding earth for the betterment of humanity, even though you’re the one that invaded,” i start rattling off, “and plus, you’re crazy smart and have magic, and you have daddy issues, just ticking off all the protagonist boxes.” loki’s lip starts to curl up, but i laugh suddenly. “a token protest,” i declare. “you can’t have done all this for yourself.” 

“never mind, the aesir-“ he starts to get smaller again, more human, as he tries to change the subject, but i reach out a hand, or really wave it haphazardly. he stops. “what?” 

“can you stay like this?” i ask. it makes this whole thing feel a little more genuine. everyone thinks he’s asgardian, but his parents and i know the truth. really, i feel trusted. “you don’t have to.” 

“the aesir,” he continues slowly, returning to the same shade of blue, “are asgardians with great power, but very few are known; thor is one, odin another, and there are two unnamed aesir who hold the titles of enchantress and executioner, but they haven’t been seen since before thor or i were born.” 

“odin’s our only shot,” i conclude, but that isn’t exactly good. he banished thor, banished loki, used loki, and hasn’t done a single thing to stop thanos or the invasion of earth. well, spare send thor, but that didn’t turn out too well. 

“the bifrost has been destroyed, so without the tesseract with the space stone inside, there’s no way to reach asgard, if either of us were welcome,” loki explains and sets my book aside, leaning back as if he’s comfortable. “but the infinity stones disappeared when proxima midnight removed thanos’ gauntlet.” 

“i did that,” i admit, “i could feel that there was something overwhelmingly powerful about them, but they were still solid, so i used that property to send them away.” 

“you wielded two infinity stones at the same time.” 

i grimace. it sounds terrifying when he phrases it like that. “i’m not-“ that powerful? i might be. “i bent the rules, loki, i didn’t walk over and hold them with my bare hands.” he arches a judgemental brow. “i’m not exactly keen on digging the space stone up again, though.” 

“the bifrost was built with the tesseract, so the space stone is the only thing that can repair it,” he argues. “after that, you can send it away again.” 

“assuming the thing listens to me.” 

“give me a little while to come up with a conductor, like the spear thanos gave me,” he quips, then suddenly stands and starts to speed towards the library. i notice as he strides away, eventually disappearing from view, that he remains jotunn. when i crack open my book for some bedtime reading, the jotunn page includes a portrait of him. 

i open up a wormhole and send the space stone back to the planet i originally buried it in just when the asgardian army begins to advance down the rainbow bridge. loki frowns, at our imminent doom as well as my gleeful destruction of his new spear. 

“you still have the designs,” i remind him, “don’t feel too bad.” 

“you could have separated them before sending it back,” he insists, but goes quiet when the marching gets louder. “let me do the talking,” he mutters, as if i’ve ever done otherwise. “i and my companion-“ i note the title with a start- “seek an audience with your king, odin.” 

“loki,” a tall woman with dark hair starts. except the entire army is tall, so whatever. i’m pitifully tony, here, even though i’m above average on earth. or, i was. the kree are huge, too. “you are a wanted criminal.” 

“just because odin doesn’t like me doesn’t mean i committed a crime, lady sif,” loki replies smoothly, grinning and bowing slightly. “we mean no harm, but i must say before you come any closer.” he gestures to me, not raising at all. “this is vanessa robinson, an inhuman from midgard; she passed through the terrigen mist and emerged invulnerable to all materials, especially metal.” he turns back to the army. “should your blades touch her skin, they will fall apart.” i keep my expression vaguely polite. they just saw me throw an infinity stone-bearing spear into a wormhole i created, after using the spear to repair the bridge, after using another wormhole to bring loki and myself to the bridge. “i would also like to point out that we just fixed the bifrost.” 

“i cannot grant you an audience with odin until he decides to hear your trial.” 

“lady sif, i do not plead guilty to any crimes,” loki insists with a friendly smile. “all of you can be in the room, making sure we don’t cause trouble, i don’t care; we just seek an audience with odin.” 

“it’s a lot easier for us to stop you now than it is once you have a weapon trained on our king,” lady sif argues. loki and i are dressed as innocently as possible; me in my dress, him in a draping tunic. i try to say with my eyes that i would never kill a king, even though i’ve already done so once and considered it a million times during my training with traedenn.   
a murmur passes from the back to lady sif, and she frowns before announcing, “odin has granted your request, but frigga will strip you of your magic before you enter the throne room.” 

“very well,” loki nods after a moment, wincing. he’ll see his mother and then lose his magic and then see his father. i can’t imagine this’ll go too well, but at least i’ll be able to get a read on odin while i try not to think about my own parents. at least if i don’t really want to reunite with my own family, i can reunite another family. the army gives me a wide berth and shackles loki. 

frigga is more elegant than my book depicts. she smiles sadly at loki and nods lady sif out of the room before reaching out and pulling him into a hug. for a second, loki looks like he’s going to try, but he stiffens and frigga leans away. 

“how i’ve missed you, my son,” she tells him, and strokes his hair. “i don’t want to close your magic,” she continues, “you’ve done such wonderful things with it.” and then, she turns to me. “i can see the connection you share.” i think about asking her if he’s still brainwashing me, but loki’s having a bad enough day. i can deal with it later, i’ve made it this far. 

“mother,” loki interrupts, and holds his cuffed hands out. “it is his wish.” finally, she nods and connects their palms. once again, loki stands blue as the day he was born. i don’t make that joke. frigga opens the throne room door, and i notice as we walk- loki shuffles, clanking- that the throne room on earth is eerily similar. i also don’t make that joke. 

“loki,” odin greets, voice echoing high into the ceiling as we approach, “vanessa robinson.” i nod and stop when loki does, already peering around with my mind’s eye. the landscape doesn’t matter, not that it makes any sense; i shake off my curiosity and look at frigga, then odin, then lady sif pacing outside, of the shape of the uniform is anything to go off. i look deeper, in the moments of silence where odin just stares at us, and try to find what it is that makes each asgardian unique; what’s inside, what flows, what jumps. 

“we have repaired the bifrost, and now seek-“ 

“silence,” odin snaps, and i watch the air in his throat as i stare blankly at his golden eyepatch. they all seem like humans, behaving as expected, but there’s something more. their muscles are corded differently, their everything just bigger. “you sent frost giants to attack a coronation, to kill me, and you tried to destroy an entire realm.” well, that wasn’t me. “then, when we all thought we were free of you, you emerged on midgard and conquered it, killing thor!” 

“he isn’t dead,” loki mutters. 

“you killed him!” odin bellows. “and now, you show up here, seeking audience with me?” i do everything but shut my eyes to search odin, find what makes him different. a male guard passes by, and i follow him for a better comparison. odin is older- much older- but suddenly it strikes me. i blink my eyes wider again and relax; i have the answer. i could find an energy like odin’s anywhere. it’s like his atoms are supercharged with electricity, breaking laws of matter and energy, waiting to be released. “boy, you are disgraced!” odin rants, in my distraction. “no wish of yours will go fulfilled from this day, and you will rot forever in asgard’s cells!” 

loki seems to notice that i’ve stopped zoning out and glances over at me. i nod; it’s done, we can go whenever. i mark the look of it into my brain, try to dog-ear odin’s location so i can see him from earth. and if i can? i’ll be able to find thor. 

“actually,” loki starts, and turns to the door we came out of. i follow his gaze and see frigga. “i’ll be needing my magic back, because we’re leaving.” 

“you’ll have neither,” odin argues. 

“odin, i don’t owe fealty to you, as i was a prisoner and a spoil of war when you called me your son,” loki declares. his expression is tight, but i’m sure it feels good to say. “i don’t belong here, in your dungeons, halls, or even on asgard; this was never my home, and the only people who ever treated me kindly were your own wife and son.” 

“just because you don’t want to be here doesn’t mean you don’t have to be here,” odin practically growls. his one eye narrows, and his hand squeezes his staff. the energy starts to bubble like carbonation, like a hot spring- is he going to attack us? i open my mouth to warn loki. 

“but i lied, as is my disposition,” loki admits, “the title you yourself gave me, a power your wife did.” he holds out his shackles and nods, so i lay my hand on them and break them. odin continues to bubble up. i don’t know if i’d be able to protect us from whatever it is he can do. “vanessa can do a lot more than break things,” loki continues, but much quieter, as if only telling me. he stretches his fingers, still long and patterned, and then the same green shimmer as back on the kree ship is in the air again. odin shouts, standing, and frigga rushes forward. “we should probably leave,” loki whispers. odin and frigga can’t see us, and cry out frantically, but loki sighs and steps toward me, ducking his head. we’re normally closer in height. “vana.” 

“i- right,” i stutter, and blink and jump into action. reality is a fold, this dimension one line that i can twist and connect with itself. if i poke a hole right beside us, there is loki’s suite. i follow him through and close the opening behind myself. “frigga didn’t take your magic?” 

“she trapped it in the shackles,” he explains, going to the kitchen and pouring himself a drink. “it’s something she’s done before, when i would get in trouble and be sent to my room; the guards would take the shackles off because i was locked in, but i would still have magic as a comfort.” she sounds like a good person. maybe not a great wife, but then again, it might be her role to undermine odin’s cruelty. “you breaking them did the same thing, thankfully.” 

“thankfully?” i repeat, dumbfounded. “you weren’t sure it was gonna work?” 

“we’d be safe still, though it would be a lot harder to find thor.” i swallow back shock and nod. probably true. “but since i still have magic, all i have to do i open up a few dimensions, and all you have to do is search them.” he takes a long drink, revealing that the lines continue along his neck and frame his adam’s apple. a human trait that’s kind of funny to see on an alien, but the effect is no different. sue me, men have necks. “we should probably sleep first, so nothing goes wrong.” he looks at me with a frown for a moment, but then sets his cup down and retires to his bedroom. i have nothing else to do, so i mimic him and lay down on my own bed, still wide awake. 

in the morning, we’re going to get thor back. in a couple weeks, my parents are going to move back into their house. in a couple months, ben will join them. but i won’t, and thor will probably attack loki and then skip off to asgard. loki has chosen to be selfless, to risk his magic and his appearance and a secure position as thanos’ governor to help- who, exactly? no one’s really going to be happy with the arrangement on earth. the kree think of us inhumans as weapons, the humans as little inferior beings. everyone from earth has had their planet invaded and conquered, their families torn apart, and now they’ll have to deal with the kree attitude. with the kree around, the governments of the world are only going to be in place as a formality, an illusion of representation. in truth, the kree empire doesn’t care about its inhabitants, only its expansion. 

it’s now loki’s job to buffer between the empire and representatives of earth, human and inhuman. all i can do is protect him. neither of us will get our families back. that is, if there’s any family to get back. at this point, i suppose i can say that i trust loki, that he’s a good man, that being around him all the time isn’t the downside to keeping my position as bodyguard. he’s beautiful, and kind, and smart. but i don’t know if my brothers are alive, and while i want to trust him about that, i just can’t. safety is one thing, family is another. 

i’m still uncomfortably awake, even though the sun has long since set, so i close my eyes and reach out with my mind. the earth is, well, right there. i practice calculating gravity, circumference, temperature. then i look closer, at the people; the kree stand out easily from the humans; blood thicker, bones more sponge-like and stronger, taller and more muscular overall. they’re also coated in a silicate compound, and- strangely- the blue is actually a rarity, only present in the kree under loki’s personal employ. i can see, now, the colors that light reflects; i can’t see what they look like, not really, but it’s easier to visualize like the wind. 

the kree are diurnal, so the ones opposite the planet from me- in the pacific- work while others closer to me sleep. loki built his palace in africa, far from new york and far from winds that come from new york. now that the radiation is gone, that isn’t a worry, but the view is beautiful. i pull away and turn to the stars, trying to think of odin. of thor. what will i look for, come morning? that energy, built up, how it bubbled and nearly exploded. 

there. 

i can feel odin, and i look closer at him. he’s sleeping, too. but it’s like he’s in a bubble- i don’t know where he is, so i can’t twist the ribbon of reality to get to him. logically, i know he’s in asgard, but that won’t help me find thor. so i study odin’s appearance until things become a little clearer. bit by bit. 

and then i’m finally tired, just when i find a candle next to odin’s bed, so i pull myself from the bubble and slowly come back to earth and my own body. it feels a lot better than being taken out of it, but i’m still exhausted. so, content, i sleep. 

“breakfast,” allosh, the kree chef, tells me. i rub at my eyes and stretch, feeling like traedenn just broke my face. i stumble into the kitchen and sit, nearly knocking a glass of water off the table. 

“vana?” loki prompts, and when i look over, he’s glamoured and squinting at me. “is something the matter?” 

“um, no,” i dismiss, and dig in, occasionally trying to wake my eyes. obviously, loki doesn’t believe me, but he doesn’t say anything. just keeps squinting at me until i break. “our project is going to take a really long time,” i admit. loki dismisses allosh and we go to the library, where a million book are out and open. quickly, i explain what i did to find odin. 

“we have time,” loki finally decides, after flipping through a larger book. then, “was odin the only aesir your could find?” i nod. “there might be more in the other dimensions.” i sure hope so, or it’s only odin and not thor that i’m able to find. “what’s the difference between the infinity stones and odin, that you could see the location of the space stone but not asgard?” 

“the stones are-“ it’s difficult to describe. the mind stone, i only know where it is because i left it there. the space stone, it’s like i know where it is half because i wielded it, half because my powers are so similar to it. there’s another stone that feels the same, but i can’t quite put my finger on its location. the space stone is the most familiar. yet another stone is on earth somewhere, but also not on earth. but i try not to think about them. “they’re powerful, and it seems like they have minds of their own.” like they’re sentient, they want to be found. they almost call to me. “i know where they are, but i try not to think about it too much, because it’s kind of- overwhelming.” like too much air, too much light. too much power. 

“but you found a candle at odin’s bedside?” yes, maybe that could help pinpoint thor’s location. “do you think you could try to find thor now, or do you want to wait?” i decide to get it over with. loki pulls out a blank paper and marks it with characters i don’t understand. then, he steps close, and puts his hands on both my shoulders as his skin color starts to fade to blue. “relax,” he murmurs, eyes glowing green, and then i blink and we’re in the middle of a forest. “we haven’t moved,” he explains, “so i’ll watch for danger while you search; lay down.” i do. 

i start with the trees around me, but try to think big; it’s a forest, in a region, on a continent, and he’s right. we’re in the same place as loki’s palace, but it isn’t there. we’ve come to a world where the invasion didn’t happen, or didn’t succeed, or succeeded differently. the wind is patterned the same, mountains and plates the same shape, but oh. radiation. before fear can set in, i send it away from africa, ensuring my own safety; change the vectors, they’re just particles. there are still humans on earth, i can find them moving around. but new york is a crater. so in this world, the invasion was stopped by the nuke. there’s no evidence of aliens, only corpses of them. 

i turn away from the earth and search the stars, jumping from one to another, and then to asgard, to titan, to hala. odin isn’t anywhere to be found, but another aesir sits on the throne, causing great relief; it isn’t just odin that i can find. the aesir is a woman, though, so i continue my search. 

“we can always come back and try again,” loki says, and i hear him without having to return to earth. but i keep looking, running along the ribbon of this dimension. it’s barely different from my own. finally, i sigh, back in my own body. 

“he isn’t in the known universe,” i tell loki in a heavy breath. “also, this earth is irradiated, we should go.” i don’t open my eyes, but he rests his hands on my arm and then the floor of his library replaces the soft dirt. 

“let’s wait a few days before the next one,” he decides, sounding short of breath as well. “that took more out of me than i expected. i open my eyes, and he’s marking on the same paper, but then he turns back to me and bends down. “shall i carry you to your bed?” he asks. shocked, i don’t answer, so he nods and scoops me up, and i quickly catch his shoulder for stability. 

i don’t know if i’ve been carried since i was a toddler. it’s therapeutic. loki smells like the cold, and i get a closer look at the ridges and carvings in his skin. 

we do wait a few days before visiting the next dimension, and then another, and then another. we still haven’t found thor by the time loki has to stop to facilitate all the humans moving back into their homes. 

i wear my cloak and beg the tailor for a mask, because i have to stand behind loki’s shoulder as he addresses the humans in australia. i barely receive my knight-like helmet a moment before boarding the vehicle to go. but i’m sufficiently disguised as i step onto the first stage. everyone’s been divided by language, but mandarin has been divided into three groups because there’s so many people. still, we face two hundred million people for the first speech. loki begins telling the humans in fluid mandarin that they’ll be moved to their homes in the next few hours, and that information on how to use the kree infrastructure is posted anywhere they can find it, even for the blind and deaf. it’s remarkably handicap friendly, too. for the next group, and the next, it’s a day away and another day away, a two week operation to reintroduce humans to their own planet. i only know what loki’s saying because i know what he’s going to say- i’ve already been told everything. 

my parents are in the seventh group loki speaks to. they’re nearly at the front, and they’re alive. mom’s hair is much longer, grey roots to her ears, and dad’s hair is nearly to his shoulders. they look different. not in a horrible way, but i’m not sure it’s a good change, either. they’re well past tired, a bit thinner, a bit older. they breathe, though, when loki tells them they’ll be back in the midwest soon enough. obviously it’s good news, but at the same time, my stomach drops. i know they’ll be happy, but i also know i won’t be with them. i don’t know if i’ll even see them again after this. a sacrifice; worth it, but a sacrifice nonetheless. 

it’s almost funny how loki can retain his silken way of speaking in every language. he tells everyone it’s going to be difficult and but close to their way of life before this all happened, and they believe him. hell, i believe him. nobody likes him, but they believe him. it’s bizarre. well, almost nobody likes him. 

“do you take wives?” a woman probably close to my age asks, pushing her way through the crowd to gasp desperately. “i’ve spent my whole life studying monarchy,” she declares. everyone around her frowns, and a few people blush. “and i can’t go back to my old life, please!” 

the chitauri wait on loki’s command, but he doesn’t give any. instead, he frowns, too. “what’s your name?” 

“vanessa,” the woman replies. for a second, loki looks back at me, like he’s holding in a laugh. 

“vanessa,” he continues, turning back to the woman. “you can do with your life as you please; there are many jobs available once you’re settled in, and you can take this as a second chance at the dreams you may have in life.” 

“but do you take wives?” vanessa insists. it’s like she’s an exact clone of me, though we look completely different. 

“i don’t plan to,” loki answers easily, and continues his speech. when vanessa continues, he motions and the chitauri take her away. what a fucking metaphor. i’m terrified, as is everyone else in the crowd, as she kicks and screams and eventually silences when she’s taken to a different area. alive, no doubt, but now quiet. 

when we return to the palace after hours on end of talking, talking, talking. i hold myself- and loki, when he quietly asks how the hell i manage it- up with gravity. how loki keeps talking escapes me, but it doesn’t matter that much. the assimilation has begun. loki and i both pass out in his suite, but he did it. he’s doing it. he’s restoring the earth; he didn’t lie about that. 

there’s a sizable break between when the humans move in and the inhumans, but loki is busy running around and making sure it goes smoothly. when it was just the kree, he didn’t have to keep an eye on the goings on as much, but as the humans get used to the kree and vice versa, he has to mediate for hours every day and night. i don’t have much to do then, just standing and making sure nobody attacks loki, so i stretch my mental legs and try to be faster in finding odin. finding his surroundings, even more. really, i don’t know how thor hasn’t been in any of the dimensions we’ve checked so far. i mean, statistically, it seems a bit odd. one of them must have a thor, even if it isn’t loki’s thor. 

the inhumans move in after nearly three months, and loki is even busier. the kree are simultaneously disgusted and enamoured by inhumans, and the humans are simultaneously relieved to have their families back and disgusted by what they’ve become. i don’t see ben, but he must notice my absence when everyone’s been placed. it takes a while for everyone to get used to it, but loki convinces all the humans that their relatives haven’t really changed, that they’ve been through a lot. he also convinces the kree to remember that it wasn’t them who conquered the planet, it was loki and the chitauri with thanos’ guidance, meaning the earth is their place of residence and not their property. it works, somehow. 

we check two more dimensions, and i find a thor, finally. he’s in asgard, safe and healthy. loki gets ready to step through a wormhole, but i frown. 

“you’re there too,” i tell him, seeing the cold, the shoulders, the hands. “and they’re-“ dancing. they’re dancing, at some kind of ball, with other people around them, other asgardians. “they’re at a party.” 

“we should wait until he’s alone,” loki advises, then remarks, “you’ve gotten much better at this.” it’s true, i’ve been practicing looking at things further away in my mind’s eye while remaining in my body. i can speak, breathe, listen, even as i watch thor dance with lady sif. they both wear crowns, but i don’t mention this to loki. gossip isn’t that important. finally thor steps away and into a hallway with no guards, but he walks quickly. 

“now,” i tell loki, “let’s go,” and i fold the ribbon and tear the thread and then he helps me up and we step through. thor freezes; i close the wormhole as he takes the pair of us in. 

“brother,” loki gasps, equally shocked. 

“what game is this?” thor asks, crouching slightly. “who are you?” he jerks his chin towards me, “how did you get in?” i don’t gesture to where we very clearly just entered the palace through a wormhole. 

“brother, it’s me, i’ve been looking for you,” loki tries. 

“my brother loki is dancing,” thor argues, and asks again, “who are you?” 

“i am loki,” just, “from another universe; one that you disappeared from in the battle of new york.” thor shakes his head, doesn’t seem to understand. “on midgard.” 

“i’ve never been to midgard.” 

loki ducks his head and looks at the floor. i fold and prepare a wormhole back to africa. “we’ll keep looking, then.” for a second i worry thor is going to attack us, but he nods. 

“i wish you luck in your travels, strange as they are.” 

loki doesn’t suggest another try for a while. some of the inhumans from the moon- they’re actually there, i finally checked- are assimilated in, and everyone’s starting to get used to the new earth. ethan and nathan return home, nathan with the power to conjure fire in his palms and ethan with the power to transform into a cat at will. they’re a little stranger, but they’re home. 

“loki,” i start hesitantly, stepping into his library. he looks up from a letter. “once we find thor, like after that, because we are going to find him,” he doesn’t seem convinced of this, but he motions for me to continue. “what’s going to happen?” i try not to sound as desperate as vanessa did. loki seems reminded of her, though. 

“you’ll return to your family,” he answers quietly. i pick up one of my textbooks for the familiarity and sit in my chair. 

“i can’t,” i admit. “i-” i don’t want to say it out loud. 

“remember what i told that woman, the one with your name,” loki instructs, and sets down the letter. “i appreciate what you’ve done for me, and a beg of you to help me find my brother, but it is and has always been your choice, vana.” 

“then i choose to not return,” i argue, then stop and look down at the textbook. “i can’t face them.” 

“you will.” 

the next dimension we go to has three aesir in it; odin, thor, and a woman. i brush off the other two and narrow in on thor, who stands with a drink in has hand and metal under his feet. he’s in a tower. he’s on earth, in a tall building. i find him in new york, chatting with a few other people, reclining on a chair while two people spar on a rubber mat. “he’s in new york,” i tell loki, “he’s here.” i hear loki breathe sharply, but he doesn’t say anything. “the people around him,” i note, “they’re strong, and there’s-” electricity thrums around the building. “it’s a really secure building, like cameras everywhere.” 

“we wait until he leaves, then,” loki decides. i don’t know how long that’s going to be, as thor is completely relaxed in his seat, electrons jumping between his atoms and between his molecules. he’s more powerful than odin, more powerful than the other thor we met; he’s like a superconductor, charged up with energy. he’s like a lightning rod. he spars with someone, somehow not killing them with a single touch, and then takes a long gulp of his drink as he steps into a stairwell. there are still cameras, but i can find their blind spot. so, after a moment, loki and i are there. but this time, loki isn’t as optimistic, and doesn’t say anything when thor crouches and wields his hammer. it, too, is powerful, as an extension of him. 

“you died,” thor growls. i melt the wires of all the cameras nearby. 

“you died,” loki argues, nearly choking on the words. “thor,” he whispers, and opens his mouth again but nothing comes out. thor, though, is even more visibly confused than when he started. 

“what are you talking about?” 

“do you remember the battle in new york, with the chitauri?” thor nods, asks why, but loki continues. “do you remember the midgardian weapon, a missile?” thor nods again. “do you remember where is was going to explode?” 

thor looks down, and then raises his hand to his head, and then looks his brother up and down. “i thought it was going to hit this tower, i watched it approach knowing it was too late,” he mutters. “the other avengers tried to catch it, but i was afraid to set it off with my touch, so i continued to fight the chitauri; you were gone, i don’t know where.” footsteps begin to echo in the stairwell, so i melt the person’s shoes, even though they’re six floors away. “the next thing i knew, i and the other avengers were on the ground, and tony, my friend, he was in the portal, he fell out of it, but-” but the timing was off. this is our thor. i can’t fucking believe it, this is our thor! 

“brother,” loki gasps, and rushes over, hugging thor. and thor hugs him back. i nearly cry with relief- logically, it should have taken us years to find this dimension. they are infinite to search through. but here we are. “i’m so sorry,” loki sighs into his shoulder. when they part, thor turns to me. 

“might i ask your name, my lady?” 

“vana,” i answer happily, as loki provides my full name. “we’ve searched for so long, it really is amazing that you’re actually here; are you ready to go back?” 

but thor surprises me. loki, too, but who knows. “there is a great threat to this universe, that i cannot leave unresolved.” 

“thanos,” loki nods, evidently unsurprised. “vana killed him in our universe.” thor blinks, and then grins, stepping over to clap me on the shoulder. i jump a bit, but grin back, flattered. 

“you are a mighty warrior,” he announces. “will you join me in defeating the mad titan once again?” 

just when i nod, the door thor entered the stairwell through is blown off its hinges. i must have broken the electronic lock when i was trying to destroy the cameras. before i know it, there’s a solid number of guns being pointed at the three of us, as the avengers have gathered. i only recognize iron man, but then realize with a start that one of the men is dressed as captain america. like, second world war hero captain america. “what’s this about?” iron man, better known as tony stark, demands. for a moment, nobody says anything, shocked into silence at the abrupt change. then loki laughs slightly and raises his hands, opening his mouth to explain the intrusion away. “yeah, go ahead and try, jon snow, please explain why you’ve cheated death again.” 

thur jumps in before loki can offend anyone by being too nice. “my brother has returned with his companion to help me defeat a danger much greater than hydra, my friend; there is no reason to worry.” 

“companion?” stark repeats, and then a few of the weapons that were pretty much focused on loki are moved to include me. “who are you?” before i can answer, though, stark continues, “and why did you feel the need to kill all the electronics in the stairwell, thor, if there’s no threat?” i try to ask thor to continue to take that fall with my eyes. 

“um,” i start, which is really great. “i’m from another universe.” 

“i conjured her by accident, and she told me she had just seen the villain we’re searching for die,” loki quickly lies. “sometimes i move things between dimensions, and it is incredibly fortunate that she’s from one where our enemy has been defeated.” 

“this is true,” thor vouches, “and i apologize for your stairwell; i was as surprised to see my brother as you are.” stark doesn’t seem too enthused about teaming up with loki, but asks again what my name is. “yes, she’ll need a name,” thor agrees, though as stark protests, he asks what my power is. 

“i’m invulnerable,” i tell him, surprised at how fucking hilarious this whole thing is. i know thor will roll with what loki or i say to the avengers. he gives me a nod with a twinkle in his eye. 

“we can call her-” he spits out an unintelligible word, and stark lowers his weapons with a sigh. “means armor.” 

“fine, let’s go; thor, no more frying.” loki and i are led out to a living area a few floors up with a bunch of glass around. but when stark enters the room, the glass lights up like a bunch of computer screens. 

“whoa,” i gasp, as the man waves his arm and a bunch of them change. “wait, what is this?” stark gives me an unimpressed look while stepping out of his iron man suit, and gestures vaguely. 

“technology, is that not a thing on your planet?” 

i flinch and look at loki; it’s been a little difficult the last three years. but this isn’t the sort of thing that could have made the difference between pre-new york and now if the invasion failed. “i’m from earth,” i defend, “should have gone to seoul.” helen cho probably had access to this sort of thing. i wonder where she is now as stark squints at me and then turns back to the screens. 

“so this guy is bigger than hydra, but you saw him die?” he asks, hands poised over a keyboard. i nod, and tell them that thanos died from an electric baton to the brain stem. “so he can die like any of us, what makes him special?” 

“he searches for the infinity stones, six artifacts from the origin of the universe that are rumored to provide unlimited power over the physical world, reality, even souls,” loki explains. “i was under his employ when i attacked new york, and used the mind stone to control doctor selvig.” 

“the scepter?” one of the men asks. “are we really gonna pretend you’re not still on his side, if this even is true?” 

“agent barton,” thor tries, but agent barton strides towards loki with a knife out. 

“no, no, no,” he says, “you can fool them, but you can’t fool me-” and then he tries to put the knife to loki’s throat, so i throw my hand in between and break the blade. loki turns and stares at me, but barton keeps pulling out weapons. finally, he gives up after i catch his punch and singe his knuckles. “what the hell?” 

i don’t know how to excuse my behavior, but thankfully, loki saves me. “i’m sorry for what i did, agent barton, it is wrong for anyone to lose control of their own facilities to benefit a cause they don’t believe in; i made you hurt people, including your loved ones, and for that, i apologize.” thank fuck. barton steps back with a nod and a frown, and no one asks why the hell i defended loki when we’re supposed to barely know each other. “the mind stone was in the scepter, the space stone in the tesseract.” 

“we came into contact with the reality stone in the aether,” thor adds. “if thanos collects the stones, he will be able to wipe out all life in the universe and create his own; he will be able to do anything he so wishes.” stark types as we speak, and visuals appear around the room. “there are six stones in total.” i step closer to one of the screens and watch as a red nebula, the scepter, and the tesseract are pulled up onto the one i’m looking at. but the scepter is hydra. with wide eyes, i turn back to loki and point at the name, but he isn’t supposed to know what hydra is, so i quickly stop and keep reading. “thanos has a grand plan to erase half of all life once he collects the stones, and he will do anything to get them.” 

“but he had the scepter, and let it go?” the man dressed as captain america wonders, arms crossed. “why would he trust you with it, and why hasn’t he come to get it back?” 

“he didn’t know it was in there,” loki explains easily. “they are hidden throughout the galaxies, incredibly difficult to find.” stark nods and waves an arm, and then the screen in front of me is replaced with something that looks like microsoft paint. i hold back a laugh, but draw thanos best i can, including measurements more vague than i actually know. it’s considerably worse than loki’s illustration, and a lot sloppier than the titan looks in reality, but it’s sufficiently ugly and informative, so i leave it and try not to share a conspiratorial smile with loki. 

“okay,” stark starts when he sees my drawing, and laughs, thankfully. so i laugh, too, a little embarrassed about my art skills and amused at the same time. “so this sentient grape-” he has to stop and laugh again, and i have to try and not correct grape to raisin- “tell me more about him.” 

this time, when we face thanos, it’s with the avengers and no infinity stones. well, one infinity stone, that i send away in the same manner that i did the first time. so no infinity stones. there isn’t months of buildup, this time. stark and bruce banner- both doctors, though no one seems to address this- find a way to send out an invitation for thanos and meet him in a large field. it feels like we’re off to fight in the civil war, or something. i remark this, and the man dressed as captain america tells me it’s nothing like any battle he’s fought in. 

“you mean new york?” i ask, as the black order are beamed down. 

“uh, no,” the man replies, “more like the alps, azzano.” 

“you’re not actually like, a reincarnated captain america, right?” the black order is approaching. the man grimaces. 

“guess you didn’t get the memo, but they sort of dug me up a few years ago.” oh, fuck. so hydra killed captain america twice? bastards. “you ready?” 

“oh, oh yeah,” i nod quickly, but shiver. when loki and i return, the black order won’t know that i killed their leader twice. but this black order does know, at least about my intentions. 

“we got your letter,” proxima midnight announces. “but i don’t see the mind stone here.” 

“yeah, it ran off,” stark tells her, “apparently they do that.” 

“and loki, i’m surprised you show your face again,” she continues with a dark smirk. “are you ready for your punishment?” she’s interrupted when stark snaps his armor closed and fires a missile at her, and the battle begins. the avengers run, and an army of outriders are beamed down from the ship. proxima midnight yells, and the outriders echo her, and for a moment i’m frozen. but then loki appears at my side and sets a light hand on my shoulder. 

“my brother forgives me,” he murmurs, leaning closer, but not by much. “not because he is naive, but because he is wise and kindhearted; if you think your family is the same, have faith that they’ll forgive you, too.” i gulp, and suddenly am overwhelmed by the urge to kiss him. 

“you’re a good person,” i tell him, and grab his hand. “you haven’t used your mind control on me in a while, have you.” he closes his eyes, which is as good as a confirmation. 

“let’s go,” he finally says, and pulls me by the hand toward the battle. there are outriders that have noticed us, but the black order seems preoccupied with the avengers. so loki and i stand back to back and take them out, me with only the illusion of invulnerability, loki with magic. i try to take his words to heart as i fight; my family is kindhearted, and they will forgive me. i’m the only one stopping that from happening, the only one shaming myself for remaining at loki’s side. i treat each outrider as traedenn, and when thanos himself appears, everyone turns towards him. 

“looks like armor was right,” stark crackles through the earpiece i was given. “he looks like a fucking raisin.” 

“tony,” captain america admonishes, while i laugh nervously. “armor, you said he can die like any of us?” 

“try to go for a really fatal wound,” i advise, pressing on the piece like i was told to activate the microphone. thank fuck, or i’d have some answering to do about my conversation with loki. “he is really strong, and like, huge.” 

“yup, noted,” cap grunts, and when i look over, he’s taking on thanos himself while the other avengers continue to occupy the black order. “how’s the border holding?”

“they’re not interested in leaving, it seems,” loki answers, in the middle of tearing the head off an outrider. “i can’t even tell if any of them have noticed it.” 

“nat, can you toss me a reload?” 

“hulk coming through, tony, jump.” 

the battle is- it’s a lot. it’s loud, and smelly, and i barely know what i’m looking at. all i focus on is what hits me, which is a lot easier when it’s two kree. not so much ten or twenty outriders at a time. i accidentally break some of my clothing a few times, and nearly don’t catch a blade to my chest. thankfully, loki is at my back, occasionally reminding me of where i am and what the hell i’m doing by making his own observations in the earpiece that i can hear with my other ear, too. but when nebula appears in front of me, i freeze for just a second too long. 

“vana,” loki gasps, pulling me by the waist to himself and throwing out a hand. nebula is tossed across the field. “are you alright?” i can’t come up with any words, so i just nod, grounded by the contact. “stay close,” he whispers quickly in my ear before letting go of my waist and turning to fight more outriders. i just try to make my lungs work. 

“armor, loki, he’s headed in your direction!” natasha as captain america calls her, or nat as barton says, or widow as stark says, shouts in my earpiece. i take a few deep breaths and brace myself, turning to face thanos as he approaches with a giant sword. 

“did you think that you could get away with this?” thanos asks, in his deep, rolling, definitely evil voice. “where is the mind stone, asgardian?” 

loki tilts his head up and flips his knife after removing it from an outrider. they stop attacking us when thanos approaches, so i stand at the ready to break thanos like i did for his funeral. “i’m not asgardian,” loki remarks, and steps calmly toward the titan. “it is unlike you, titan, so gravitate towards a skirmish when all of a planet’s warriors are gathered, leaving the rest of the inhabitants defenseless.” 

“i keep my promises,” thanos explains. “and i promised you a fate worse than death is you failed me.” as loki tries to attack with his knife, thanos grabs him by the neck and squeezes. 

“you- forget-” loki gasps, as i’m already running at the pair of them and breaking thanos into trillions of trillions of pieces. 

“what is it, loki?” thanos mocks. 

“you’re not immortal,” loki answers, and drops to his feet as thanos screams. i can’t imagine it isn’t painful to be torn from the inside out, but i continue, and melt the titan down to his basic elements right in the middle of the field. “different this time,” loki gasps, regaining his breath after being choked. “thanks for saving me.” 

“thanks for saving me,” i throw back and bump his shoulder with my own. the outriders swarm us, noticing the death of their leader, but i break them, too, giving up on the illusion. loki informs the avengers that the puddle in front of us is what remains of thanos. most of them yelp in confusion, but stark replies that he fucking knew there was something weird about me. loki points out that he didn’t say why thanos became a puddle, only that he is one, but stark doesn’t retract his statement. 

“thor, you wanna take out that ship, so we can clean up?” captain america suggests, and within moments, i shiver- thor sends out some of that electricity, hardly a fraction, and lightning strikes thanos’ ship, snapping it in half. fucking hell. 

the black order retreat somehow, taking escape pods away, and the rest of the outriders are defeated, so loki drops his wall around the field. slowly, the avengers regroup by thanos’ remains. “this is seriously what’s left?” stark asks. i nod. “how the hell did you do it?” 

“i- um- don’t know how to explain it in less than an hour,” i answer honestly, and shrug. “but yeah, that’s him, you can go back to taking down hydra.” loki conceals a laugh with a cough, but thor grins, joining him. 

“i suppose i have one more thing, before we go,” he remarks. 

“jane?” loki guesses, and thor nods. i don’t mention sif. 

“thank you for your help, vana,” thor tells me quietly, smiling and resting his hands on my shoulders. “you are strong and fearless, a great warrior as i have already said.” i thank him, blushing despite myself, and he turns to the avengers. “i’m afraid my brother and i must go with-” he says the same word again, the one that means armor- “back to her universe, and we have no intention of returning.” they all frown. “i also regret to mention that loki is also from that universe, so in this one, i have no idea if he’s actually dead.” he smiles and nods, turning back to me and loki before adding, “i wish you luck in your missions.” stark asks if we’re going to help at all with the aftermath, but the three of us don’t answer while thor asks if i have a way to transport us to jane’s apartment. 

once we’re back in loki’s suite, we find allosh knocking on the library door. “my king?” the kree calls. “is everything all right?” 

“perfect timing,” loki mutters, and answers that everything’s fine, what is there to eat. 

“it’s been a week,” allosh informs us, instead of answering. “traedenn and olzo demand your presence, and vanessa can’t possibly live this long without food or water.” loki sighs and glamours the room, giving it a green shimmer, before he opens the door. allosh is pale and wringing his hands, a weirdly human move. loki sighs again and gestures to the room. “oh, allosh whimpers. “i apologize, my king.” 

“it’s fine, i understand,” loki waves a dismissive hand. “send word to traedenn and olzo that i’ll be meeting them in lai shi, that’s today?” 

“in an hour, actually, you said you were taking six days off, and it’s been seven.” good thing allosh keeps track of that sort of thing even though it isn’t his job. 

“thank you, allosh,” loki tells him, and closes the door, waving away the glamor. “i made it look like we were feasting,” he explains, and gathers up the paper he’s been marking off for the different dimensions. thor looks around the small library with a slight frown. i don’t mention that we should probably be leaving- or that we should have left hours ago. 

instead, i explain to thor where we are and where we’re going- loki’s palace, inhuman training grounds- so he doesn’t feel too lost. “there’s quite a bit to catch up on, but it seems the convergence you mentioned came and went without incident.” no one was in europe at the time. loki glamours thor, and we take the elevator down to the vehicles, but loki stops me before i can board. thor steps on, and i frown in confusion. “what?” i prompt. 

“vana, you know what,” loki tells me, quietly. i blink at him- that’s it? after all this, everything at each other’s side, and now i have to leave? 

“you didn’t just keep me to get him back,” i snarl, and he shakes his head; this isn’t about thor. “then what?” 

“i already told you, go to your family.” 

“you said i have a choice,” i argue, and lower my voice, at the risk of getting any attention from any guards hanging around. “you said i could have left at any moment, and i told you, i choose to stay.” 

“you belong with your family,” loki hisses. i shove him, but not hard. he frowns deeper, holding his hands out placatingly. “vana, you deserve to leave all this behind.” 

“if i go,” i start, and he nods quickly, so i shake my head. “if,” i emphasize. “if i go, will you let me come back?” he grimaces, and then groans. 

“i won’t hire you as my bodyguard,” he answers. 

“you haven’t paid me a dime,” i point out, and turn towards the other vehicles. goodbye for now, then. i guess i do have to face them sometime. loki sighs, and steps back, starting to turn towards the vehicle with thor, but i reach out and grab his shoulder. “loki, wait,” i exclaim, and pull him into a hug. not a kiss, because i’m a coward, but a hug. “thank you,” i whisper in his ear, squeezing his shoulders tight. “i’ll see you soon.” 

when i pull away, loki has an odd look in his eye, and he lifts a hand to my chin, tilting it up even though we’re fairly close in height when he looks like this. he doesn’t say anything. and then he drops his hand and turns and boards the vehicle. they’re a hundred feet away in a second, but i know he looks back at me, so i wave. 

time to go home, then. 

the kree infrastructure is strange, but i manage to navigate the right not-boats and not-trains to arrive back at my apartment. my apartment, first, because i kind of missed it. my roommate is nowhere to be found, and the kitchen has been reconstructed with kree technology, but my room is pretty much untouched. it smells a little different; the kree have better filtration. i have no clue how they outfitted all the buildings in the world with their gadgets, but it seems that they did. 

i’m in my uniform, so i dig through my closet and hang it up carefully, happily showering with my own soaps- in a really nice new shower- and dressing in my own clothes, including undergarments. oh, to wear a bra again. normally i hate them, but the familiarity is comforting. i feel normal, for a second, looking at myself in my boots and jeans and t-shirt and jacket in the mirror. i can tie my hair into a ponytail again. drink tap water from a plastic cup instead of mystery liquid from a metal goblet. but still, i carefully hang my uniform, stuffing the shoes with tissues to keep the shape. and then i set out for my parents’ house. 

i get fewer looks from other humans and inhumans on public transit when i’m actually dressed like someone from earth, but by the time i knock on the door, i’m worried about how i look. is it a lie? i can’t just pretend none of it happened. mom opens the door and immediately bursts into tears. 

and then i do. and then dad does. and then ethan and nathan are there, and i run over to ben and hug him, apologizing profusely under my breath. 

“i thought he was keeping you,” he whispers back. “i thought you were a slave.” 

“he needed my help, but he doesn’t anymore,” i explain quickly, “can i tell you all about it?” ben frowns, and then says he wants the whole family to know. i pale, but nod, thinking of loki’s words. thor forgave loki for killing countless innocents, i can be forgiven for killing thanos and the outriders. “okay,” i start, “um, before you all get too excited about me being back, i have some things to say.” 

i tell them. we sit at the dinner table, and i explain everything. everything about thanos, loki, the invasion, the terrigenesis, the vision, the black order. i tell them about brilzal and allosh and traedenn and olzo, about the tailor and skye, about the power i received. i explain the infinity stones, or the ones i know of, the whole truth; that time is within my reach, space, reality, but i don’t want them. i know where the mind stone is, but i don’t want it. i don’t want any of it, i tell them. fondly, i recall the book, all the aliens and stories in it, and my textbooks. i recall asgard, lady sif and frigga and odin, and the entire search for thor, where that led us, up to mere hours ago. i tell them about the plan from the beginning, to kill thanos and restore earth, how it didn’t happen how loki wanted but he felt confident that this was the best way. i tell them that i don’t know how thor will affect all this, but i know it’ll be in a positive way. finally, i explain what i’ve concluded about loki himself; that he’s a good, selfless man, with a kind heart and a keen mind. and then i close my eyes and sit, silent, at the table. 

i don’t want to see their reactions, but in the silence that follows my story, i can’t help my curiosity. i look. 

“sweetheart,” mom gasps, and swipes at her eyes, where tears fall. “i’m so sorry you had to go through that.” she lifts my hands into her own, one scarred across the palm. “you’re home now.” 

“i’m sorry for what i did, i’m so-“ 

“there’s nothing to apologize for,” dad interrupts, setting a hand on my shoulder. i feel tears streak across my face, but i see him clearly with the help of my mind’s eye, weary as it is. “we’re so proud of you, for everything.” 

“our prayers were answered,” mom declares, taking ben’s hand, too. and ben is leaned towards me, mouth agape, crying, too. “our family is together again!” 

there’s a lot of awkward laughter and sobbing and nose-blowing, but eventually, we calm down. i get my phone back- mom put it on the mantle, confident i’d be back to reclaim it- and even find my computer recovered from the wreckage of the shelter. i got a hundred on the paper. 

“should i go back to school?” i ask ben, stepping onto the porch with a beer to sit with him. he huffs a quiet laugh. “it does feel a little silly, at this point.” 

“did you know, there’s a full two year gap where no one was born?” he asks. “maybe even longer.” i ask him the significance. “they put me back in school, but everything’s so different; it’s like we’re in kindergarten, because the kree know so much more than we do.” he sighs and accepts the beer i brought for him, because he’s old enough now, which is strange because none of the things that usually happen between seventeen and twenty one happened for him. “i guess you’re a little ahead, but i don’t think the kree honor degrees.” 

“i’ll make them,” i frown. “besides, i’ve been to hala, not that cool.” i’ve only been there in my head, but whatever. “they just know how magnets work, and i don’t.” at this, ben laughs out loud, spitting out his drink. 

“i’m sorry i judged you, before,” he says quickly. i don’t expect it. “if you want to go back to work with loki, it would be okay, i mean.” 

“he said he won’t hire me again,” i remind my brother, but he shakes his head. 

“you know, my friend at school heard this rumor from the mess in australia, that a woman named vanessa asked loki if he takes wives.” 

i blush. “yeah, i was there, she begged him to not make her return to the life she had before, and said she studied monarchy, i think,” i provide, and emphasize, “it wasn’t me, i was literally masked and on stage.” 

“it’s funny, though, like, crazy funny,” ben snorts. i roll my eyes. “you’re standing there with a super obvious crush on loki, and then this lady goes-“ 

“shut the fuck up,” i snap, laughing and blushing, and ben snorts again. 

i return to my apartment, at least, and take a job as a farmer. really, i study alien seeds in a lab all day, which i’m happy enough with. but then loki is announced to visit new york on the fifth anniversary of the battle, and i’m noticing some strange things going on with my biology, so i get on the next train east. yes, east, because i told loki i’d return but i also want to stay with my family, so i ended up chickening out and staying in my apartment. with everyone long since finding out that the radiation was cleared by some unnamed alien technology, the turnout for loki’s event is huge. i don’t really know what to expect from the whole thing. 

quite a bit of new york, i find out, has been reconstructed. but it looks like venice, roads replaced with water, the whole thing on mental stilts that i find go deep beneath what’s left of the ground. most of the building are now identical, but there are shopfronts selling trinkets and food and even books. physical books, on this new earth. i find my way to where avengers tower stood in the other dimension and find a statue to the avengers; captain america, iron man, barton, natasha, the hulk, and even thor. when i stand in front of the structure and turn around, looking down the not-street in a straight line, a statue of loki rises from the water. it, too, has a ribbon around it, but it doesn’t appear to be accessible. as noon turns into afternoon, a loud greeting is heard from the direction of the loki statue. i try not to choke on my bagel and rush towards the sound. 

“hello everyone,” loki begins. “i wanted to begin tonight by introducing this statue of myself, but it is quite- shall we say gaudy?” he laughs lightly, his crowd-pleaser, and indeed, it echoes through the audience. “i had this constructed not out of pride for myself, but because i wouldn’t be in this position were it not for the people of earth,” he continues. “your resilience and kindness taught me that a king does not rule over his people, but provide for them, and i aim to do so.” everyone claps, and he cuts the ribbon with a blade that’s only there for a moment. then, he asks for everyone to turn around, and he stands in front of the avengers statue. “this is for your heroes; they served you well, giving their lives to protect your world.” he pauses for a moment, and his voice bounces around the buildings. “though the avengers were fighting me, and i then should leave them in the past where they were defeated, it was actually a force of earth that destroyed this place, and the avengers caught against this organization as well, known as hydra.” whispers break out. “they were noble warriors, and we must honor their memory in striving to be as strong-willed as they were, as brave and kind.” with a few more words, and then an announcement that thor actually survived the battle but only recovered from his wounds and returned once the structure was already built, thor flies in and lands next to his brother. i smile as they seem like they’re going to shake hands, but then hug. 

“thank you,” thor says, voice echoing throughout the city. “all of you, thank you, for everything.” and then he cuts the ribbon. 

there’s some sort of festival that follows, but i slip through the city on the tail of thor’s raucous laughter and the energy that only i can see. eventually i find him in a shawarma joint, ordering for himself and loki. for a moment, i don’t know what to do, so i just stare at them through the window. loki’s hair is just tousled, dry and loose. his eyes are bright, and though his cheekbones are sharp, his face isn’t hollow. he wears a dark suit and crosses his arms, shoving thor back when he gets nudged. i find myself smiling before long. 

“is that thor and loki?” someone asks, making me jump. “sorry.” they’re human, and from a quick look, only human. “but is it?” 

i look back inside the join with a sigh. “yeah, it’s them,” i mutter. 

the person hums. “i’m gonna go ask for a picture, are you coming in?” i shake my head. “suit yourself.” they do as they intend, grinning between the brothers as the cashier wields their phone. as they leave, they wave their phone at me with raised brows, but shake their head when i don’t react. 

i sigh again and i continue watching while the brothers sit with their food. thor happily digs in, recounting a story between bites. loki nods along. i bit my lip. fuck it. so i open the door and stride in and sit at the table with them and grin when thor yells. 

“vana, my friend!” he laughs. “it’s been a while, hasn’t it, loki?” i look carefully at loki, and he seems- really surprised. 

“it has,” he agrees distantly. thor recounts something about catching up on all that happened when he was in the other universe, and yes i pay attention, but yes i also state an inappropriate amount at loki, who stares right back. when thor quiets for a moment, he tells me, “i thought you weren’t coming back.” 

“here i am,” i counter. “and i told you i would.” 

“shall i get some more of this fine food for you, my lady?” thor offers, but i politely decline, citing my bagel. “may i ask how you found us?” 

“the same way i found you before,” i answer with a shrug. “you’re really powerful, thor, more powerful than all the other aesir i’ve encountered.” thor frowns, and messes with the leather tassel on the end of his hammer’s handle. “i think odin knew this and restricted you to the hammer, but i’ll admit to bias.” 

“he did attack you,” loki remarks. 

“and you,” i correct. “listen, guys, i’m a farmer now, and i gotta say, my thirst for knowledge is not being quenched.” 

“you can find textbooks in any old library,” loki says, but i shake my head. who knows how he knew which textbooks to get me, but loki is smarter than any kree. 

“you said you wouldn’t hire me again, but i want to study with you again.” 

thor grins, but doesn’t say anything. he just gives loki a look. and loki, loki blushes and bites his lip and closes his eyes. “i didn’t want to ask in a diner in new york city,” he mutters, and thor laughs. i narrow my eyes in confusion, hoping for the best- did he also want me to come back? “but i have a condition for your return.” easy enough. i nod. “i wish for you to be my equal, and if you ever stand at my side again, it must be on the same ground that i stand.” 

“okay, yes, that’s the easiest thing ever, if a little, you know, embarrassing, but i made things right with my family, i can show my face,” i start to ramble and he taps at the table, continues to look down. so i stop. “is it like, a formal position?” he nods. thor looks like he’s about to burst. finally, loki raises his eyes to mine, and gets up from his chair before kneeling on the ground in front of me. i blink and shake my head a bit, and shock begins to consider my fingertips because- because i didn’t know. “i-“ 

“will you stand beside me as you have before, and honor me in taking the title of queen?” he conjures a ring, a simple gold band with just a sparkle of green. the cashier gasps, and thor pretty much implodes. i don’t even know what to do. 

“i didn’t know-“ i blurt, and then lean in and stop a few inches from his face, because i’m not getting engaged before kissing the guy first. 

“vana,” he whispers, saying my name the way only he does, so i lean closer and bring my hand to his jaw and close my eyes and i kiss him. i do, just a brush, and then a pull. he’s so soft, and cold, and i get addicted to the feeling almost instantly, but i have to pull away to gasp. 

“yes.” 

and then i lean in again, and feel the ring being slid onto one of my fingers, but i don’t care which it is. distantly, thor cheers, and the cashier is calling someone into the room, but the world is easy to ignore. instead i run my hand along loki’s jaw, and then trace the patterns that i remember into his neck, gasping and trying to get closer, closer. he’s intoxicating. 

“vana,” he laughs, “vana,” and pulls away to show thor my hand and i remember we’re in public. the cashier has a camera trained on us, and thor is about jumping with joy. 

“i do not know of a better match for my brother,” he congratulates me, and when loki helps me stand, i’m quickly crushed in a hug. good thing, too, because i have to support my wobbling knees with gravity. because i’m engaged. to loki. we’re going to get married. i’m going to be his wife. whatever comes with that, i don’t care. “i wish the best for you both.” 

thor says that a lot. loki laughs when i can’t help but snort, thanking thor for his kindness. i feel shaky, numb with excitement and shock. “oh, fuck,” i exclaim, and turn to loki. “so- i can go to the library again?” he laughs again, and nods. 

“you always could,” he answers, raising our joined hands to kiss my knuckles. “anything you want.” his eyes sparkle with tears. i don’t know what to say. i really don’t. loudly by the cash registers, thor begins to explain that i’ve saved loki’s life on numerous occasions and helped take down a fearsome villain from another universe. distracted, i laugh again. loki smiles, but it’s a smaller, quieter smile, and he tugs me closer, leaving our hands joined and placing the other at my waist. he sways. i only notice the music once we’re dancing to it. “thor and i talked about this for a while.” 

“does this sort of thing happen on asgard?” i ask, eyeing his lips as he speaks. but loki shakes his head. 

“between the common folk, i have no idea; between nobles, everything is arranged, and then the wedding is a sort of crowning ceremony, because of the change in title that usually follows.” i remember sif’s crown. “but you’re neither of noble nor common blood, so i enlisted thor, and we learned how you all do it.” i blush and laugh. 

“i can’t believe this,” i gasp, looking away from him to stare at the ring. “subtle, though, for you.” 

“i thought you’d appreciate it.” i ask what the original plan was. “think much, much bigger, with performers and fire; it can still be arranged.” i think about it for a moment, but it doesn’t sound all that fun. i’ve always preferred private affairs, in all parts of life. i preferred thanos’ first death to his second, as the second was way too chaotic, a full on battle. too formal for me. i haven’t though that much about how i’d like to be proposed to, but this feels perfect. 

“this is perfect,” i decide, and rest my head on his shoulder like i have before. he hums, and i feel it. 

we return to the palace once the sun has set in new york, taking a vehicle back with an ecstatic thor who then excuses himself halfway through to trip to take flight. loki quietly explains that thor has decided to team up with the remaining members of shield, and lives with them somewhere in spain. for the rest of the time, it’s just the two of us, so i lean on loki and trace the lines i know are on his neck with my fingertip. 

“vana,” he gasps, and lets his head drop back, so i continue with a shiver. “can you feel them through the glamour?” he asks, voice pitched lower than usual. i shiver again. 

“it’s been stuck in my brain since i saw it,” i admit. “i can feel how cold you are, but it’s all i see behind the magic.” for a moment, as i trace, it looks like his skin is getting bluer, but it could be a trick of the light. 

“vana,” he gasps, and then grabs my hand and swallows, taking a moment to breathe. “i- i slipped,” he laughs. “maybe you should wait until we’re in the palace, so i don’t embarrass us.” he doesn’t pull away though, continues to hold my hand and run his thumb along my knuckles. i’m in love. fuck, i’m in love. we can’t get to the palace fast enough, but i wait. i bask in loki’s attention and wait. 

the palace is quiet when we enter, the sun not quite up yet but lightening the sky. i stare at him in the elevator, but he closes his eyes. when the doors open again, he lifts our joined hands and guides me past the notably still there but empty bed that i used to sleep in and towards the library, but i make another decision, and he follows me to his bedroom. 

“loki,” i prompt, once we’re inside, and i don’t think i can hold myself back for another second. “come here.” he does. i kiss him, and hesitantly pull back, close to getting lost in him again. instead i guide him towards the bed and straddle his hips once he’s settled. “you’re so beautiful,” i find myself admitting, “with the glamour and without it, you’re so beautiful.” loki gasps, and in a moment his eyes are revealed. i lean in and run my hands and lips across his neck, his cheeks, his lips. it feels so strange, the carvings and ridges, but at the same time amazing. because it’s loki. 

“vana,” he gasps again, and pulls me down to him for a formal kiss, frantic as it ends up being. 

when i think it can’t get better, i suppose. 

ben stands by his word. as my family gathers in the throne room so loki can personally introduce himself, they tell him that they already know everything. ben thanks him, not for the imprisonment or the training or any of the things that came with the invasion, but for saving my life. loki thanks him for saving his, back on thanos’ ship. ben startles, and then beams. it seems as though loki was right all along.


End file.
